Timur

“Tamerlane” and “Tamerlan” redirect here. For thepoem, see Tamerlane (poem). For the play, see NicholasRowe (writer). For the Boston Marathon bomber,see Tamerlan Tsarnaev. For other uses, see Timur(disambiguation).

Timur (Persian: ,Timūr تیمور Chagatai: Temür, Uzbek:Temur; died 18 February 1405), historically known asTamerlane[1] (Persian: لنگ Timūr(-e) تیمور Lang, “Timurthe Lame”), was a Turko-Mongol conqueror and thefounder of the Timurid dynasty in Central Asia.[2] Borninto the Barlas confederation in Transoxiana during the1320s or 1330s, he gained control of the Western Cha-gatai Khanate by 1370. From that base, he led mili-tary campaigns across West, South and Central Asia andemerged as the most powerful ruler in the Muslim worldafter defeating the Mamluks of Egypt and Syria, theemerging Ottoman Empire and the declining Sultanateof Delhi. From these conquests he founded the TimuridEmpire, although it fragmented shortly after his death.He is considered the last of the great nomadic conquerorsof the Eurasian steppe, and his empire set the stage for therise of the more structured and lasting gunpowder em-pires in the 1500s and 1600s.[3][4]:1

Timur envisioned the restoration of the Mongol Empireof Genghis Khan.[5] As a means of legitimating his con-quests, Timur relied on Islamic symbols and language,referring to himself as the “Sword of Islam" and pa-tronizing educational and religious institutions. He con-verted nearly all the Borjigin leaders to Islam duringhis lifetime.[6] His armies were inclusively multi-ethnic.Timur also decisively defeated the Christian Knights Hos-pitaller at Smyrna, styling himself a ghazi.[7]:91 By the endof his reign, Timur had gained complete control over allthe remnants of the Chagatai Khanate, Ilkhanate, GoldenHorde and even attempted to restore the Yuan dynasty.Timur’s armies were feared throughout Asia, Africa, andEurope,[7] sizable parts of which were laid waste by hiscampaigns.[8] Scholars estimate that his military cam-paigns caused the deaths of 17 million people, amountingto about 5% of the world population.[9][10]

He was the grandfather of the renowned Timurid sul-tan, astronomer and mathematician Ulugh Beg, who ruledCentral Asia from 1411 to 1449, and the great-great-great-grandfather of Babur, founder of the Mughal Em-pire, which ruled parts of South Asia for around four cen-turies, from 1526 until 1857.[11][12] Timur is also recog-nized as a great patron of art and architecture, as he inter-

acted with Muslim intellectuals such as Ibn Khaldun andHafiz-i Abru.[7]:341–2

1 Early life

Emir Timur feasts in the gardens of Samarkand.

Timur was born in Transoxiana, near the City ofKesh (an area now better known as Shahrisabz, “thegreen city”), some 80 kilometres (50 mi) south ofSamarkand in modern-day Uzbekistan, part of what wasthen the Chagatai Khanate.[13] His father, Taraqai, wasa minor noble belonging to the Barlas tribe.[13] TheBarlas were originally a Mongol tribe[14][15] that be-came Turkified.[16][17][18] According to Gérard Chaliand,Timur was a Muslim[19] but he saw himself as GenghisKhan’s heir.[19] Though not a Chinggisid or a descendentof Genghis Khan,[20] he clearly sought to invokethe legacy of Genghis Khan’s conquests during hislifetime.[21] His name Temur literally means "Iron" inold Turkic languages (Temir in modern Uzbek, Demirin modern Turkish.) Both Timur and Demir are popu-

1

2 3 MILITARY LEADER

lar male names in Turkey today.Later Timurid dynastic histories claim that he was bornon 8 April 1336, but most sources from his lifetime giveages that are consistent with a birthdate in the late 1320s.Historian Beatrice Forbes Manz suspects the 1336 datewas an invention designed to tie Timur to the legacy ofAbu Sa'id Bahadur Khan, the last ruler of the Ilkhanatedescended from Hülegü, who died in that year.[22]

At the age of eight or nine, Timur and his mother andbrothers were carried as prisoners to Samarkand by aninvading Mongol army.In his childhood, Timur and a small band of follow-ers raided travelers for goods, especially animals such assheep, horses, and cattle.[22]:116 In around 1363, it is be-lieved that Timur tried to steal a sheep from a shepherdbut was shot by two arrows, one in his right leg and an-other in his right hand, where he lost two fingers. Bothinjuries crippled him for life. Some believe that Timursuffered his crippling injuries while serving as a merce-nary to the khan of Sistan in Khorasan in what is knowntoday as Dashti Margo (Desert of Death) in south-westAfghanistan. Timur’s injuries have given him the namesof Timur the Lame and Tamerlane by Europeans.[7]:31

Timur was a Muslim, but while his chief official religiouscounselor and adviser was the Hanafi scholar 'Abdu 'l-Jabbar Khwarazmi, his particular beliefs are not known.In Tirmidh, he had come under the influence of his spiri-tual mentor Sayyid Barakah, a leader from Balkh who isburied alongside Timur in Gur-e Amir.[23][24][25] Timurwas known to hold Ali and the Ahlul Bayt in high regardand has been noted by various scholars for his “pro-Alid"stance. Despite this, Timur was noted for attacking Shi-ites on Sunni grounds and therefore his own religious in-clinations remain unclear.[26]

2 Personality

Timur is regarded as a military genius and a tactician,with an uncanny ability to work within a highly fluid po-litical structure to win and maintain a loyal following ofnomads during his rule in Central Asia. He was also con-sidered extraordinarily intelligent - not only intuitively butalso intellectually.[4]:16 In Samarkand and his many trav-els, Timur, under the guidance of distinguished schol-ars was able to learn the Persian, Mongolian, and Turkiclanguages.[7]:9 More importantly, Timur was character-ized as an opportunist. Taking advantage of his Turco-Mongolian heritage, Timur frequently used either the Is-lamic religion or the law and traditions of the MongolEmpire to achieve his military goals or domestic politicalaims.[7]

Timur facial reconstruction from skull

Map of the Timurid Empire

3 Military leader

In about 1360 Timur gained prominence as a militaryleader whose troops were mostly Turkic tribesmen of theregion.[19] He took part in campaigns in Transoxiana withthe Khan of Chagatai. His career for the next ten oreleven years may be thus briefly summarized from theMemoirs. Allying himself both in cause and by familyconnection with Kurgan, the dethroner and destroyer ofVolga Bulgaria, he was to invade Khorasan at the head ofa thousand horsemen. This was the second military expe-dition that he led, and its success led to further operations,among them the subjugation of Khorezm and Urganj.Following Kurgan’s murder, disputes arose among themany claimants to sovereign power; this infighting washalted by the invasion of the energetic Chagtaid TughlughTimur of Kashgar, another descendant of Genghis Khan.

3

Timur was dispatched on a mission to the invader’s camp,which resulted in his own appointment to the head of hisown tribe, the Barlas, in place of its former leader, HajjiBeg.The exigencies of Timur’s quasi-sovereign position com-pelled him to have recourse to his formidable patron,whose reappearance on the banks of the Syr Darya cre-ated a consternation not easily allayed. One of Tughlugh’ssons was entrusted with the Barlas’s territory, along withthe rest of Mawarannahr (Transoxiana), but he was de-feated in battle by the bold warrior he had replaced, atthe head of a numerically inferior force.

4 Rise to power

Timur commanding the Siege of Balkh.

It was in this period that Timur reduced the Chagataikhans to the position of figureheads while he ruled intheir name. Also during this period, Timur and hisbrother-in-law Husayn, who were at first fellow fugitivesand wanderers in joint adventures, became rivals and an-tagonists. The relationship between them began to be-come strained after Husayn abandoned efforts to carryout Timur’s orders to finish off Ilya Khoja (former gover-nor of Mawarannah) close to Tishnet.[7]:40

Timur began to gain a following of people in Balkh, con-sisting of merchants, fellow tribesmen, Muslim clergy,aristocracy and agricultural workers, because of his kind-

ness in sharing his belongings with them. This contrastedTimur’s behavior with that of Husayn, who alienatedthese people, took many possessions from them via hisheavy tax laws and selfishly spent the tax money build-ing elaborate structures.[7]:41–2 At around 1370 Husaynsurrendered to Timur and was later assassinated, whichallowed Timur to be formally proclaimed sovereign atBalkh. He married Husayn’s wife Saray Mulk Khanum,a descendant of Genghis Khan, allowing him to becomeimperial ruler of the Chaghatay tribe.[7]

One day Aksak Temür spoke thusly:

“Khan Züdei (in China) rules over the city.We now number fifty to sixty men, so let uselect a leader.” So they drove a stake into theground and said: “We shall run thither and heamong us who is the first to reach the stake,may he become our leader”. So they ran andAksak Timur, as he was lame, lagged be-hind, but before the others reached the stakehe threw his cap onto it. Those who arrivedfirst said: “We are the leaders.” ["But,"] Ak-sak Timur said: “My head came in first, I amthe leader.” Meanwhile, an old man arrived andsaid: “The leadership should belong to AksakTimur; your feet have arrived but, before then,his head reached the goal.” So they made Ak-sak Timur their prince.[27][28]

5 Legitimization of Timur’s rule

Timur’s Turco-Mongolian heritage provided opportuni-ties and challenges as he sought to rule the Mongol Em-pire and the Muslim world. According to the Mongoltraditions, Timur could not claim the title of khan orrule the Mongol Empire because he was not a descen-dant of Genghis Khan. Therefore, Timur set up a puppetChaghatay khan, Suyurghatmish, as the nominal ruler ofBalkh as he pretended to act as a “protector of the mem-ber of a Chinggisid line, that of Genghis Khan’s eldestson, Jochi.”[29]

As a result, Timur never used the title of khan becausethe name khan could only be used by those who comefrom the same lineage as Genghis Khan himself. Timurinstead used the title of amir meaning general, and actingin the name of the Chagatai ruler of Transoxania.[22]:106

To reinforce his position in the Mongol Empire, Timurmanaged to acquire the royal title of son-in-law when hemarried a princess of Chinggisid descent.[4]:14

Likewise, Timur could not claim the supreme title of theIslamic world, caliph, because the “office was limitedto the Quraysh, the tribe of the Prophet Muhammad.”Therefore, Timur reacted to the challenge by creating amyth and image of himself as a “supernatural personalpower"" ordained by God.[29] Since Timur had a success-

4 6 PERIOD OF EXPANSION

ful career as a conqueror, it was easy to justify his rule asordained and favored by God since no ordinary man couldbe a possessor of such good fortune that resistance wouldbe seen as opposing the will of God. Moreover, the Is-lamic notion that military and political success was the re-sult of Allah’s favor had long been successfully exploitedby earlier rulers. Therefore, Timur’s assertions would nothave seemed unbelievable to fellow Islamic people.

6 Period of expansion

Timur besieges the historic city of Urganj.

Timur spent the next 35 years in various wars and expe-ditions. He not only consolidated his rule at home by thesubjugation of his foes, but sought extension of territoryby encroachments upon the lands of foreign potentates.His conquests to the west and northwest led him to thelands near the Caspian Sea and to the banks of the Uraland the Volga. Conquests in the south and south-Westencompassed almost every province in Persia, includingBaghdad, Karbala and Northern Iraq.One of the most formidable of Timur’s opponents wasanother Mongol ruler, a descendant of Genghis Khannamed Tokhtamysh. After having been a refugee inTimur’s court, Tokhtamysh became ruler both of the east-ern Kipchak and the Golden Horde. After his accession,he quarreled with Timur over the possession of Khwarizmand Azerbaijan. However, Timur still supported him

Timur orders campaign against Georgia.

against the Russians and in 1382 Tokhtamysh invaded theMuscovite dominion and burned Moscow.[30]

After the death of Abu Sa'id, ruler of the Ilkhanid Dy-nasty, in 1335, there was a power vacuum in Persia. In1383, Timur started the military conquest of Persia. Hecaptured Herat, Khorasan and all eastern Persia by 1385;he captured almost all of Persia by 1387. Of note duringthe Persian campaign was the capture of Isfahan. WhenIsfahan surrendered to Timur in 1387, he treated it withrelative mercy as he normally did with cities that surren-dered. However, after the city revolted against Timur’staxes by killing the tax collectors and some of Timur’ssoldiers. Timur ordered the massacre of the city’s citi-zens with the death toll reckoned at between 100,000 and200,000.[31] An eye-witness counted more than 28 towersconstructed of about 1,500 heads each.[32] This has beendescribed as a “systematic use of terror against towns...anintegral element of Tamerlane’s strategic element” whichhe viewed as preventing bloodshed by discouraging re-sistance. His massacres were selective and he spared theartistic and technical (e.g. engineers) elites.[31]

In the meantime Tokhtamysh, now khan of the GoldenHorde, turned against his patron and in 1385 invadedAzerbaijan. The inevitable response by Timur resultedin the Tokhtamysh–Timur war. In the initial stage of the

5

Emir Timur’s army attacks the survivors of the town of Nerges,in Georgia, in the spring of 1396.

war Timur won a victory at the Battle of the KondurchaRiver. After the battle Tokhtamysh and some of his armywere allowed to escape. After Tokhtamysh’s initial defeatTimur invaded Muscovy to the north of Tokhtamysh’sholdings. Timur’s army burned Ryazan and advancedon Moscow. He was pulled away before reaching theOka River by Tokhtamysh’s renewed campaign in thesouth.[33]

In the first phase of the conflict with Tokhtamysh, Timurled an army of over 100,000 men north for more than700 miles into the steppe. He then rode west about 1,000miles advancing in a front more than 10 miles wide. Dur-ing this advance Timur’s army got far enough north tobe in a region of very long summer days causing com-plaints by his Muslim soldiers about keeping a long sched-ule of prayers.It was then that Tokhtamysh’s army wasboxed in against the east bank of the Volga River in theOrenburg region and destroyed at the Battle of the Kon-durcha River.It was in the second phase of the conflict that Timur tooka different route against the enemy by invading the realmof Tokhtamysh via the Caucasus region. The year 1395saw the Battle of the Terek River concluding the titanicstruggle between the two monarchs.

Tokhtamysh was not able to restore his power or prestige.He was killed about a decade after the Terek River battlein the area of present day Tyumen.During the course of Timur’s campaigns his army de-stroyed Sarai, the capital of the Golden Horde, andAstrakhan, subsequently disrupting the Golden Horde’sSilk Road. The Golden Horde no longer held power afterthe coming of Timur.In May 1393 Timur’s army invaded the Anjudan. Thiscrippled the Ismaili village only one year after his as-sault on the Ismailis in Mazandaran. The village was pre-pared for the attack. This is evidenced by it containinga fortress and a system of underground tunnels. Unde-terred, Timur’s soldiers flooded the tunnels by cutting intoa channel overhead. Timur’s reasons for attacking thisvillage are not yet well-understood. However, it has beensuggested that his religious persuasions and view of him-self as an executor of divine will may have contributedto his motivations.[34] The Persian historian Khwandamirexplains that an Ismaili presence was growing more po-litically powerful in Persian Iraq. A group of locals in theregion was dissatisfied with this and, Khwandamir writes,these locals assembled and brought up their complaintwith Timur, possibly provoking his attack on the Ismailisthere.[34]

7 Campaign against the TughlaqDynasty

In 1398, Timur invaded northern India, attacking theDelhi Sultanate ruled by Sultan Nasir-ud-Din MahmudShah Tughluq of the Tughlaq Dynasty. He was opposedby Ahirs and Jats but the Sultanate at Delhi did noth-ing to stop him.[35] After crossing the Indus river on 30September 1398, he sacked Tulamba and massacred itsinhabitants.[36] Then he advanced and captured Multanby October.[37]

Timur crossed the Indus River at Attock (now Pakistan)on 24 September 1398. His invasion did not go unop-posed and he encountered resistance by the Governor ofMeerut during the march to Delhi. Timur was still able tocontinue his approach to Delhi, arriving in 1398, to fightthe armies of Sultan Nasir-ud-Din Mahmud Shah Tugh-luq, which had already been weakened by a successionstruggle within the royal family.

7.1 Capture of Delhi (1398)

The battle took place on 17 December 1398. Sul-tan Nasir-ud-Din Mahmud Shah Tughluq and MalluIqbal’s[38] army had war elephants armored with chainmail and poison on their tusks.[7]:267 With his Tatar forcesafraid of the elephants, Timur ordered his men to diga trench in front of their positions. Timur then loaded

6 8 CAMPAIGNS IN THE LEVANT

Timur defeats the Sultan of Delhi, Nasir Al-Din Mahmud Tugh-luq, in the winter of 1397–1398, painting dated 1595–1600.

:Delhi after sack of Timur Lang, 1398

his camels with as much wood and hay as they couldcarry. When the war elephants charged, Timur set thehay on fire and prodded the camels with iron sticks, caus-ing them to charge at the elephants howling in pain:Timur had understood that elephants were easily pan-icked. Faced with the strange spectacle of camels fly-ing straight at them with flames leaping from their backs,the elephants turned around and stampeded back towardtheir own lines. Timur capitalized on the subsequent dis-

ruption in Nasir-ud-Din Mahmud Shah Tughluq’s forces,securing an easy victory. Delhi was sacked and left in ru-ins. Before the battle for Delhi, Timur executed 100,000captives:[12]

The capture of the Delhi Sultanate was one of Timur’sgreatest victories, arguably surpassing the likes ofAlexander the Great and Genghis Khan because of theharsh conditions of the journey and the achievement oftaking down one of the richest cities at the time. Af-ter Delhi fell to Timur’s army, uprisings by its citizensagainst the Turkic-Mongols began to occur, causing abloody massacre within the city walls. After three daysof citizens uprising within Delhi, it was said that the cityreeked of decomposing bodies of its citizens with theirheads being erected like structures and the bodies left asfood for the birds. Timur’s invasion and destruction ofDelhi continued the chaos that was still consuming Indiaand the city would not be able to recover from the greatloss it suffered for almost a century.[7]:269–274

8 Campaigns in the Levant

Timur defeating theMamluk Sultan Nasir-ad-Din Faraj of Egypt.

Before the end of 1399, Timur started a war with BayezidI, sultan of the Ottoman Empire, and the Mamluk sultanof Egypt Nasir-ad-Din Faraj. Bayezid began annexingthe territory of Turkmen and Muslim rulers in Anatolia.As Timur claimed sovereignty over the Turkmen rulers,they took refuge behind him.

7

Bayezid I being held captive by Timur.

In 1400 Timur invaded Christian Armenia and Georgia.Of the surviving population, more than 60,000 of the lo-cal people were captured as slaves, and many districtswere depopulated.[39]

Then Timur turned his attention to Syria, sackingAleppo[40] and Damascus.[41] The city’s inhabitants weremassacred, except for the artisans, who were deported toSamarkand.He invaded Baghdad in June 1401. After the capture ofthe city, 20,000 of its citizens were massacred. Timurordered that every soldier should return with at least twosevered human heads to show him. (Many warriors wereso scared they killed prisoners captured earlier in thecampaign just to ensure they had heads to present toTimur.)

Shakh-i Zindeh mosque, Samarkand.

In the meantime, years of insulting letters had passedbetween Timur and Bayezid. Finally, Timur invadedAnatolia and defeated Bayezid in the Battle of Ankaraon 20 July 1402. Bayezid was captured in battle andsubsequently died in captivity, initiating the twelve-yearOttoman Interregnum period. Timur’s stated motivationfor attacking Bayezid and the Ottoman Empire was therestoration of Seljuq authority. Timur saw the Seljuks asthe rightful rulers of Anatolia as they had been granted

rule by Mongol conquerors, illustrating again Timur’s in-terest with Genghizid legitimacy.After the Ankara victory, Timur’s army ravaged West-ern Anatolia, with Muslim writers complaining that theTimurid army acted more like a horde of savages thanthat of a civilized conqueror. But Timur did take the cityof Smyrna, a stronghold of the Christian Knights Hospi-talers, thus he referred to himself as ghazi or “Warrior ofIslam”.Timur was furious at the Genoese and Venetians whoseships ferried the Ottoman army to safety in Thrace. AsLord Kinross reported in The Ottoman Centuries, the Ital-ians preferred the enemy they could handle to the one theycould not.While Timur invaded Anatolia, Qara Yusuf assaultedBaghdad and captured it in 1402. Timur returned to Per-sia from Anatolia and sent his grandson Abu Bakr ibnMiran Shah to reconquer Baghdad, which he proceededto do. Timur then spent some time in Ardabil, where hegave Ali Safavi, leader of the Safaviyya, a number of cap-tives. Subsequently, he marched to Khorasan and then toSamarkhand, where he spent nine months celebrating andpreparing to invade Mongolia and China.[42]

He ruled over an empire that, in modern times,extends from southeastern Turkey, Syria, Iraq, andIran, through Central Asia encompassing part ofKazakhstan, Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia,Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, andeven approaches Kashgar in China. The conquests ofTimur are claimed to have caused the deaths of up to 17million people, an assertion impossible to verify.[43]

Of Timur’s four sons, two (Jahangir and Umar Shaykh)predeceased him. His third son, Miran Shah, died soonafter Timur, leaving the youngest son, Shah Rukh. Al-though his designated successor was his grandson PirMuhammad b. Jahangir, Timur was ultimately succeededin power by his son Shah Rukh. His most illustrious de-scendant Babur founded the Islamic Mughal Empire andruled over most of Afghanistan and North India. Babur’sdescendants Humayun, Akbar, Jahangir, Shah Jahan andAurangzeb, expanded the Mughal Empire to most of theIndian subcontinent.Markham, in his introduction to the narrative of Clavijo’sembassy, states that his body “was embalmed with muskand rose water, wrapped in linen, laid in an ebony coffinand sent to Samarkand, where it was buried.” His tomb,the Gur-e Amir, still stands in Samarkand, though it hasbeen heavily restored in recent years.

9 Attempts to attack the Ming Dy-nasty

By 1368 the new Chinese Ming Dynasty had driven theMongols out of China. The first Ming Emperor Hongwu

8 11 EXCHANGES WITH EUROPE

The fortress at Jiayuguan was strengthened due to fear of aninvasion by Timur, while he led an army towards China.[44]

Timur had aligned himself with the remnants of the Yuan dynastyin his attempts to conquer the Ming dynasty.

and his son Yongle demanded and received, homage frommany Central Asian states as the political heirs to theformer House of Kublai. The Ming emperor’s treat-ment of Timur as a vassal did not sit well with the con-queror. In 1394 Hongwu’s ambassadors eventually pre-sented Timur with a letter addressing him as a subject. Hesummarily had the ambassadors Fu An, Guo Ji, and LiuWei detained. He then had them and their 1,500 guardsexecuted.[45] Neither Hongwu’s next ambassador, ChenDewen (1397), nor the delegation announcing the acces-sion of the Yongle Emperor fared any better.[45]

Timur eventually planned to conquer China. To thisend Timur made an alliance with the Mongols of theNorthern Yuan Dynasty and prepared all the way toBukhara. The Mongol leader Enkhe Khan sent his grand-son Öljei Temür, also known as Buyanshir Khan after heconverted to Islam while he stayed at the court of Timurin Samarkand.[46] In December 1404 Timur started mil-itary campaigns against the Ming Dynasty and detaineda Ming envoy. But he was attacked by fever and plaguewhen encamped on the farther side of the Sihon (Syr-Daria) and died at Atrar (Otrar) on 17 February 1405[47]

before ever reaching the Chinese border.[48] Only afterthat were the Ming envoys released.[45]

Timur preferred to fight his battles in the spring. How-ever, he died en route during an uncharacteristic wintercampaign against the ruling Chinese Ming Dynasty. It

was one of the bitterest winters on record. His troops arerecorded as having to dig through five feet of ice to reachdrinking water.

10 Succession

Main article: Timurid dynastyJust before his death, Timur designated his grandson Pir

The Timurid empire at Timur’s death in 1405

Muhammad ibn Jahangir as his successor. However, hisother descendants did not abide by this wish, and spentthe next fifteen years engaged in violent infighting.

11 Exchanges with Europe

Main article: Timurid relations with EuropeTimur had numerous epistolary and diplomatic ex-

changes with various European states, especially Spainand France.Relations between the court of Henry III of Castile andthat of Timur played an important part in medieval Span-ish Castilian diplomacy. In 1402, the time of the Battleof Ankara, two Spanish ambassadors were already withTimur: Pelayo de Sotomayor and Fernando de Palazue-los. Later, Timur sent to the court of Castile and León aChagatay ambassador named Hajji Muhammad al-Qaziwith letters and gifts.In return, Henry III of Castile sent a famous embassy toTimur’s court in Samarkand in 1403–06, led by Ruy Gon-zales de Clavijo, with two other ambassadors, AlfonsoPaez and Gomez de Salazar. On their return, Timur af-firmed that he regarded the king of Castile “as his veryown son”.According to Clavijo, Timur’s good treatment of theSpanish delegation contrasted with the disdain shown byhis host toward the envoys of the “lord of Cathay" (i.e.,the Ming Dynasty Yongle Emperor), the Chinese ruler.Clavijo’s visit to Samarkand allowed him to report to theEuropean audience on the news from Cathay (China),which few Europeans had been able to visit directly in thecentury that had passed since the travels of Marco Polo.

9

Letter of Timur to Charles VI of France, 1402, a witness toTimurid relations with Europe.

The French archives preserve:

• A 30 July 1402 letter from Timur to Charles VI ofFrance, suggesting that he send traders to the Orient.It is written in Persian.[49]

• A May 1403 letter. This is a Latin transcriptionof a letter from Timur to Charles VI, and anotherfrom Amiza Miranchah, his son, to the Christianprinces, announcing their victory over Bayezid, inSmyrna.[50]

A copy has been kept of the answer of Charles VI toTimur, dated 15 June 1403.[51]

12 Legacy

Inside the mausoleum— deep niches and diverse muqarnas dec-oration inside the Gur-e Amir.

Timur’s legacy is a mixed one. While Central Asia blos-somed under his reign, other places such as Baghdad,Damascus, Delhi and other Arab, Georgian, Persian, andIndian cities were sacked and destroyed and their popula-tions massacred. He was responsible for the effective de-struction of the Christian Church in much of Asia. Thus,while Timur still retains a positive image in Muslim Cen-tral Asia, he is vilified by many in Arabia, Persia, andIndia, where some of his greatest atrocities were carriedout. However, Ibn Khaldun praises Timur for having uni-fied much of the Muslim world when other conquerors ofthe time could not.[52]

Timur’s short-lived empire also melded the Turko-Persian tradition in Transoxiania, and in most of the terri-tories which he incorporated into his fiefdom, Persian be-came the primary language of administration and literaryculture (diwan), regardless of ethnicity.[53] In addition,during his reign, some contributions to Turkic literaturewere penned, with Turkic cultural influence expandingand flourishing as a result. A literary form of ChagataiTurkic came into use alongside Persian as both a culturaland an official language.[54]

Tamerlane virtually exterminated the Church of the East,also known to Westerners as the Nestorian church, which

10 12 LEGACY

Emir Timur and his forces advance against the Golden Horde,Khan Tokhtamysh.

had previously been a major branch of Christianitybut afterwards was largely confined to certain parts ofIraq.[55]

Timur became a relatively popular figure in Europe forcenturies after his death, mainly because of his victoryover the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid. The Ottoman armieswere at the time invading Eastern Europe and Timur wasironically seen as a sort of ally.Timur has now been officially recognized as a nationalhero of newly independent Uzbekistan. His monumentin Tashkent now occupies the place where Marx's statueonce stood.Muhammad Iqbal, a philosopher, poet and politician inBritish India who is widely regarded as having inspiredthe Pakistan Movement,[56] composed a notable poem en-titled Dream of Timur, the poem itself was inspired by aprayer of the last Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah II:

The Sharif of the Hijaz suffers due tothe divisive sectarian schisms of his faith,And lo! that young Tatar (Timur) has boldly

re-envisioned magnanimous victories of over-whelming conquest.

In 1794, Sake Deen Mahomed published his travel book,The Travels of Dean Mahomet. The book begins with thepraise of Genghis Khan, Timur, and particularly the firstMughal Emperor Babur. He also gives important detailson the then incumbent Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II.

12.1 Historical sources

Ahmad ibn Arabshah's work on the Life of Timur.

The earliest known history of Timur’s reign was Nizamad-Din Shami's Zafarnama, which was written duringTimur’s lifetime. Between 1424 and 1428, Sharaf ad-Din Ali Yazdi wrote a second Zafarnama drawing heav-ily on Shami’s earlier work. Ahmad ibn Arabshah wrote amuch less favorable history in Arabic. Arabshah’s historywas translated by the Dutch Orientalist Jacobus Golius in1636.As Timurid-sponsored histories, the two Zafaramaspresent a dramatically different picture from Arabshah’schronicle. William Jones remarked that the former pre-sented Timur as a “liberal, benevolent and illustriousprince”, while the latter painted him as “deformed andimpious, of a low birth and detestable principles.”

12.1.1 Malfuzat-i Timuri

TheMalfuzat-i Timurī and the appended Tuzūk-i Tīmūrī,supposedly Timur’s own autobiography, are almost cer-tainly 17th century fabrications.[12][57] The scholar AbuTaleb Hosayni presented the texts to the Mughal emperorShah Jahan, a distant descendent of Timur, in 1637–38,

12.3 Exhumation 11

supposedly after discovering the Chagatai Turkish origi-nals in the library of a Yemeni ruler. Due to the distancebetween Yemen and Timur’s base in Transoxania and thelack of any other evidence of the originals, most histo-rians consider the story highly implausible and suspectHosayni of inventing both the text and its origin story.[57]

12.2 European views

Timur arguably had a significant impact on theRenaissance culture and early modern Europe.[58] Hisachievements both fascinated and horrified Europeansfrom the fifteenth century to the early nineteenth century.European views of Timur were mixed throughout the fif-teenth century with some European countries calling himan ally, while others saw him as a threat to Europe be-cause of his rapid expansion and brutality.[59]:341

When Timur captured the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid atAnkara, he was often praised and seen as a trusted allyby European rulers such as Charles VI of France andHenry IV of England because they believed he was sav-ing Christianity from the Turkish Empire in the MiddleEast. Those two kings also praised him because his vic-tory at Ankara allowed Christian merchants to remain inthe Middle East and allowed for their safe return hometo both France and England. Timur was also praised be-cause it is believed that he helped restore the right of pas-sage for Christian pilgrims to the Holy Land.[59]:341–44

Other Europeans viewed Timur as a barbaric enemy whopresented a threat to both European culture and the re-ligion of Christianity. His rise to power moved manyleaders, such as Henry III of Castile, to send embassiesto Samarkand to personally scout out Timur, learn abouthis people, make alliances with him and to try to con-vince him to convert to Christianity in order to avoidwar.[59]:348–49

In the introduction to a 1723 translation of Yazdi’s Za-faranameh, the translator wrote:[60]

[M. Petis de la Croix] tells us, that there arecalumnies and impostures, which have beenpublished by authors of romances, and Turk-ish writers who were his enemies, and envi-ous at his glory: among whom is Ahmed BinArabschah…As Timur-Bec had conquered theTurks and Arabians of Syria, and had eventaken the Sultan Bajazet prisoner, it is no won-der that he has been misrepresented by the his-torians of those nations, who, in despite oftruth, and against the dignity of history, havefallen into great excesses on this subject.

A forensic facial reconstruction of Timur by M. Gerasimov(1941).

12.3 Exhumation

Timur’s body was exhumed from his tomb in 1941 bythe Soviet anthropologist Mikhail M. Gerasimov. Fromhis bones it was clear that Timur was a tall and broadchested man with strong cheek bones. Gerasimov recon-structed the likeness of Timur from his skull. At 5 feet 8inches (1.73 meters), Timur was tall for his era. Gerasi-mov also confirmed Timur’s lameness due to a hip injury.Gerasimov also found that Timur’s facial characteristicsconformed to that of Mongoloid features with somewhatCaucasoid admixture. In the study of “Anthropologicalcomposition of the population of Central Asia” showsthe cranium of Timur predominate the characters of theSouth Siberian Mongoloid type.[61] Timur is classified asbeing closer to the Mongoloid race with some admixture.It is alleged that Timur’s tomb was inscribed with thewords, “When I rise from the dead, the world shalltremble.” It is also said that when Gerasimov exhumedthe body, an additional inscription inside the casket wasfound reading, “Who ever opens my tomb, shall unleashan invader more terrible than I.”[62] In any case, thesame day Gerasimov begun the exhumation, Adolf Hitlerlaunched Operation Barbarossa, the largest military inva-sion of all time, upon the USSR.[63] Timur was re-buriedwith full Islamic ritual in November 1942 just before theSoviet victory at the Battle of Stalingrad.[64]

12 14 DESCENDANTS OF TIMUR

12.4 In the arts

• Tamburlaine the Great, Parts I and II (English,1563–1594): play by Christopher Marlowe

• Tamerlane (1701): play by Nicholas Rowe (English)

• Tamerlano (1724): opera by George Frideric Han-del, in Italian, based on the 1675 play Tamerlan oula mort de Bajazet by Jacques Pradon.

• Bajazet (1735): opera by Antonio Vivaldi, portraysthe capture of Bayezid I by Timur

• Il gran Tamerlano (1772): opera by Josef Mys-liveček that also portrays the capture of Bayezid Iby Timur

• Tamerlane: first published poem of Edgar Allan Poe(American, 1809–1849).

• Timur is the deposed, blind former King of Tar-tary and father of the protagonist Calaf in the operaTurandot (1924) by Giacomo Puccini, libretto byGiuseppe Adami and Renato Simoni.

• Timour appears in the story Lord of Samarkand byRobert E. Howard.

• Tamerlan: novel by Colombian writer Enrique Ser-rano in Spanish[65]

• Tamburlaine: Shadow of God: a BBC Radio 3 playby John Fletcher, broadcast 2008, is a fictitious ac-count of an encounter between Tamburlaine, IbnKhaldun, and Hafez.

• Tamerlane (1928): historical novel by Harold Lamb.

13 Gallery

• Geometric courtyard surrounding the tomb showingthe Iwan, and dome.

• View of the Registan.

• Timurid Mosque in Herat.

• Goharshad Mosque, Timurid architecture

• Green Mosque (Balkh) is a Timurid mosque that in-spired Shah Jahan.

• Bibi-Khanym Mosque

• Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi, a prime ex-ample of Timurid architecture.

14 Descendants of Timur

14.1 Sons of Timur

• Jahangir Mirza ibn Timur

• Umar Shaikh Mirza I

• Miran Shah ibn Timur

• Shahrukh Mirza ibn Timur

14.2 Sons of Jahangir

• Pir Muhammad bin Jahangir Mirza

14.3 Sons of Umar Shaikh Mirza I

• Pir Muhammad ibn Umar Shaikh Mirza I

• Iskandar ibn Umar Shaikh Mirza I

• Rustam ibn Umar Shaikh Mirza I

• Bayqarah ibn Umar Shaikh Mirza I

• Mansur ibn Bayqarah• Husayn ibn Mansur bin Bayqarah

• Badi' al-Zaman• Muhammed Mu'min• Muzaffar Hussein• Ibrahim Hussein

14.4 Sons of Miran Shah

• Khalil Sultan ibn Miran Shah

• Abu Bakr ibn Miran Shah

• Muhammad ibn Miran Shah

• Abu Sa'id Mirza• Umar Shaikh Mirza II

• Zahir-ud-din Muhammad Babur• the Mughals• Jahangir Mirza II

14.5 Sons of Shahrukh Mirza

• Mirza Muhammad Taraghay – better known asUlugh Beg

• Abdul-Latif

• Ghiyath-al-Din Baysonqor

• Ala-ud-Daulah Mirza ibn Baysonqor• Ibrahim Mirza

13

• Sultan Muhammad ibn Baysonqor• Yadigar Muhammad

• Mirza Abul-Qasim Babur ibn Baysonqor

• Sultan Ibrahim Mirza

• Abdullah Mirza

• Mirza Soyurghatmïsh Khan

• Mirza Mohammed Juki

15 See also

• Ahmad Jalayir

• Global Empire

• List of the Muslim Empires

• Muslim conquest in the Indian subcontinent

• Tamburlaine (play)

• Harold Lamb, author of the historical novel Tamer-lane (1928)

• Taimur, named after Timur, is an intercontinentalballistic missile being developed by Pakistan.

16 Notes[1] /ˈtæmərleɪn/

[2] Josef W. Meri (2005). Medieval Islamic Civilization.Routledge. p. 812.

[3] Darwin, John (2008). After Tamerlane: the rise and fallof global empires, 1400-2000. Bloomsbury Press. pp. 29,92. ISBN 9781596917606.

[4] Manz, Beatrice Forbes (1989). The rise and rule ofTamerlane. Cambridge University Press.

[5] Beatrice Forbes Manz, “Temür and the Problem of a Con-queror’s Legacy”, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society,Third Series, Vol. 8, No. 1 (Apr., 1998), p. 25; “Inhis formal correspondance Temur continued throughouthis life as the restorer of Chinggisid rights. He even justi-fied his Iranian, Mamluk and Ottoman campaigns as a re-imposition of legitimate Mongol control over lands takenby usurpers...”

[6] Michal Biran, “The Chaghadaids and Islam: The Conver-sion of Tarmashirin Khan (1331–34)", Journal of Ameri-can Oriental Society, 122 (2002), p. 751; “Temur, a non-Chinggisid, tried to build a double legitimacy based on hisrole as both guardian and restorer of the Mongol Empire.”

[7] Marozzi, Justin (2004). Tamerlane: Sword of Islam, con-queror of the world. HarperCollins.

[8] Matthew White: Atrocitology: Humanity’s 100 Dead-liest Achievements, Canongate Books, 2011, ISBN9780857861252, section “Timur”

[9] “The Rehabilitation Of Tamerlane”. Chicago Tribune. 17January 1999.

[10] J.J. Saunders, The history of the Mongol conquests(page 174), Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1971, ISBN0812217667

[11] “Timur”. Encyclopædia Britannica, Online AcademicEdition. 2007.

[12] Beatrice F. Manz (2000). “Tīmūr Lang”. Encyclopaediaof Islam 10 (2nd ed. ed.). Brill. Retrieved 24 April 2014.

[13] “Tamerlane”. AsianHistory. Retrieved 1 November2013.

[14] “Central Asia, history of Timur", in Encyclopædia Bri-tannica, Online Edition, 2007. (Quotation:"...Under hisleadership, Timur united the Mongol tribes located in thebasins of the two rivers.")

[15] "Islamic world", in Encyclopædia Britannica, Online Edi-tion, 2007. Quotation: "Timur (Tamerlane) was of Mon-gol descent and he aimed to restore Mongol power....”

[16] Carter V. Findley, The Turks in World History, OxfordUniversity Press, 2005, Oxford University Press, 2005,ISBN 978-0-19-517726-8, p. 101.

[17] G. R. Garthwaite, “The Persians”, Malden, ISBN 978-1-55786-860-2, MA: Blackwell Pub., 2007. (p.148) Quo-tation:...Timur’s tribe, the Barlas, had Mongol origins buthad become Turkic-speaking ... However, the Barlus tribeis considered one of the original Mongol tribes and thereare “Barlus Ovogton” people who belong to Barlus tribe inmodern Mongolia.

[18] M.S. Asimov & Clifford Edmund Bosworth, History ofCivilizations of Central Asia, UNESCO Regional Office,1998, ISBN 92-3-103467-7, p. 320: "... One of his fol-lowers was [...] Timur of the Barlas tribe. This Mongoltribe had settled [...] in the valley of Kashka Darya, inter-mingling with the Turkish population, adopting their reli-gion (Islam) and gradually giving up its own nomadic ways,like a number of other Mongol tribes in Transoxania ...”

[19] Gérard Chaliand, Nomadic Empires: From Mongolia tothe Danube translated by A.M. Berrett, Transaction Pub-lishers, 2004. translated by A.M. Berrett. TransactionPublishers, p.75. ISBN 0-7658-0204-X. Limited pre-view at Google Books. p. 75., ISBN 0-7658-0204-X,p.75., “Timur Leng (Tamerlane) Timur, known as the lame(1336–1405) was a Muslim Turk. He aspired to recreatethe empire of his ancestors. He was a military genius wholoved to play chess in his spare time to improve his militarytactics and skill. And although he wielded absolute power,he never called himself more than an emir.”, “Timur Leng(Tamerlane) Timur, known as the lame (1336–1405) wasa Muslim Turk from the Umus of Chagatai who saw him-self as Genghis Khan’s heir.”

14 16 NOTES

[20] Timur did not claim to be a descendant of Genghis Khaneither, as in 1370 he installed a puppet khan as the ruler ofthe Chagatai, in recognition of the Mongol laws that onlya blood descendant of Genghis Khan was allowed to rule.(Marozzi, p. 342)

[21] Richard C. Martin, Encyclopedia of Islam and the MuslimWorld A-L, Macmillan Reference USA, 2004, ISBN 978-0-02-865604-5, p. 134.

[22] Manz, Beatrice Forbes (1988). “Tamerlane and the sym-bolism of sovereignty”. Iranian Studies 21 (1-2): 105–122. doi:10.1080/00210868808701711.

[23] The Descendants of Sayyid Ata and the Rank of Naqīb inCentral Asia by Devin DeWeese Journal of the AmericanOriental Society, Vol. 115, No. 4 (Oct. – Dec., 1995),pp. 612–634

[24] Four studies on the history of Central Asia, Volume 1 ByVasilij Vladimirovič Bartold p.19

[25] Islamic art By Barbara Brend p.130

[26] Virani, Shafique N. The Ismailis in the Middle Ages: AHistory of Survival, A Search for Salvation (New York:Oxford University Press), 2007, p. 114.

[27] Sinor, D., "XIV The Making of a Great Khan", page 242,Studies in Medieval Inner Asia, Variorum, 1997. ISBN0-86078-632-3

[28] Radloff, W., Proben der Volkslitteratur der türkischenstämme Süd-Sibiriens, IV. St Petersburg, page 308

[29] Manz, Beatrice Forbes (2002). “Tamerlane’s Careerand Its Uses”. Journal of World History 13: 3.doi:10.1353/jwh.2002.0017.

[30] Nicholas V. Raisanovsky; Mark D. Steinberg: A Historyof Russia Seventh Edition, pg 93

[31] Chaliand, Gerard; Arnaud Blin (2007). The History ofTerrorism: From Antiquity to Al Qaeda. University of Cal-ifornia Press. p. 87. ISBN 978-0520247093.

[32] Fisher, W.B.; Jackson, P.; Lockhart, L.; Boyle, J.A. : TheCambridge History of Iran, p55.

[33] Nicholas V. Raisanovsky; Mark D. Steinberg: A Historyof Russia Seventh Edition, pg 94

[34] Virani, Shafique N. The Ismailis in the Middle Ages: AHistory of Survival, A Search for Salvation (New York:Oxford University Press), 2007, p. 116.

[35] Singh, Raj Pal. Rise of the Jat power. Books.google.co.in.Retrieved 2012-05-22.

[36]

[37] Hunter, Sir William Wilson (1909). “The Indian Empire:Timur’s invasion 1398”. The Imperial Gazetteer of India2. p. 366.

[38] Mallu who later received the title of Iqbal Khan was a no-ble in Siri an ally of Muqarrab Khan. But later on be-trayed him and Nusrat Khan, and allied with Nasir-ud-dinMahmud Shah. History Of Medieval India; V.D. Maha-jan p.205

[39] “The Turco-Mongol Invasions”. Rbedrosian.com. Re-trieved 2012-05-22.

[40] Aleppo:the Ottoman Empire’s caravan city, Bruce Masters,The Ottoman City Between East and West: Aleppo,Izmir, and Istanbul, ed. Edhem Eldem, Daniel Goff-man, Bruce Master, (Cambridge University Press, 1999),20.

[41] Margaret Meserve, Empires of Islam in Renaissance His-torical Thought, (Harvard University Press, 2008), 207.

[42] Stevens, John. The history of Persia. Containing, the livesand memorable actions of its kings from the first erectingof that monarchy to this time; an exact Description of allits Dominions; a curious Account of India, China, Tar-tary, Kermon, Arabia, Nixabur, and the Islands of Cey-lon and Timor; as also of all Cities occasionally men-tion'd, as Schiras, Samarkand, Bokara, &c. Manners andCustoms of those People, Persian Worshippers of Fire;Plants, Beasts, Product, and Trade. With many instructiveand pleasant digressions, being remarkable Stories or Pas-sages, occasionally occurring, as Strange Burials; Burningof the Dead; Liquors of several Countries; Hunting; Fish-ing; Practice of Physick; famous Physicians in the East; Ac-tions of Tamerlan, &c. To which is added, an abridgmentof the lives of the kings of Harmuz, or Ormuz. The Persianhistory written in Arabick, by Mirkond, a famous EasternAuthor that of Ormuz, by Torunxa, King of that Island,both of them translated into Spanish, by Antony Teixeira,who liv'd several Years in Persia and India; and now ren-der'd into English.

[43] Graziella Caselli, Gillaume Wunsch, Jacques Vallin(2005). "Demography: Analysis and Synthesis, Four Vol-ume Set: A Treatise in Population". Academic Press. p.34.ISBN 0-12-765660-X

[44] Turnbull, Stephen (30 January 2007). The Great Wall ofChina 221 BC-1644 AD. Osprey Publishing. p. 23. ISBN978-1-84603-004-8. Retrieved 2010-03-26.

[45] Tsai, Shih-Shan Henry (2002), Perpetual Happiness: TheMing Emperor Yongle (2 ed.), University of WashingtonPress, pp. 188–189, ISBN 0-295-98124-5

[46] C. P. Atwood-Encyclopedia of Mongolia and the MongolEmpire, see: Northern Yuan Dynasty

[47] Adela C.Y. Lee. “Tamerlane (1336–1405) – ''The LastGreat Nomad Power''". Silkroad Foundation. Retrieved2012-05-22.

[48] Tsia 2002, p. 161

[49] Document preserved at Le Musée de l'Histoire de France,code AE III 204. Mentioned Dossier II, 7, J936

[50] Mentioned Dossier II, 7 bis

[51] Mentioned Dossier II, 7 ter

[52] Frances Carney Gies (September–October 1978). “TheMan Who Met Tamerlane”. Saudi Aramco World 29 (5).

15

[53] Manz, Beatrice Forbes (1999). The Rise and Rule ofTamerlane. Cambridge University Press, p.109. ISBN 0-521-63384-2. Limited preview at Google Books. p.109.“In Temür’s government, as in those of most nomad dy-nasties, it is impossible to find a clear distinction betweencivil and military affairs, or to identify the Persian bureau-cracy as solely civil or the Turko-Mongolian solely withmilitary government. In fact, it is difficult to define thesphere of either side of the administration and we find Per-sians and Chaghatays sharing many tasks. (In discussingthe settled bureaucracy and the people who worked withinit I use the word Persian in a cultural rather than ethnolog-ical sense. In almost all the territories which Temür incor-porated into his realm Persian was the primary languageof administration and literary culture. Thus the languageof the settled 'diwan' was Persian and its scribes had to bethoroughly adept in Persian culture, whatever their ethnicorigin.) Temür’s Chaghatay emirs were often involved incivil and provincial administration and even in financialaffairs, traditionally the province of Persian bureaucracy.”

[54] Roy, Olivier (2007). The new Central Asia. I.B. Tauris.p. 7. ISBN 1-84511-552-X.

[55] “History of the Nestorians”.

[56] “Iqbal S Hindu Relations”. The Telegraph (Calcutta, In-dia). 30 June 2007.

[57] Hameed ud-Din (2011). “Abū Ṭāleb Ḥosaynī".Encyclopædia Iranica. Retrieved 17 September 2014.

[58] Milwright, Marcus (2006). “So Despicable a Vessel: Rep-resentations of Tamerlane in Printed Books of the Six-teenth and Seventeenth Centuries”. Muqarnas 23: 317.doi:10.1163/22118993-90000105.

[59] Knobler, Adam (November 1995). “The Rise of Timurand Western Diplomatic Response, 1390–1405”. Jour-nal of the Royal Asiatic Society. Third Series 5 (3).doi:10.1017/s135618630000660x.

[60] The History of Timur-Bec 1. 1723. pp. xii–ix. Punctua-tion and spelling modernized.

[61] Anthropological composition of the population of CentralAsia: and the ethnogenesis of its peoples by Lev Vasilʹe-vich Oshanin, Henry Field

[62] “Uzbekistan: On the bloody trail of”. The Independent(London). 9 July 2006. Retrieved 25 May 2010.

[63] Mark & Ruth Dickens. “Timurid Architecture inSamarkand”. Oxuscom.com. Retrieved 2012-05-22.

[64] Marozzi 2004

[65] Enrique Serrano (2011-01-02). Tamerlan (BibliotecaBreve) (Spanish Edition). ISBN 9789584205407. Re-trieved 2012-05-22.

17 References• This article incorporates text from a publication now

in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911).Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). CambridgeUniversity Press.

18 External links• Media related to Timur at Wikimedia Commons

• Timur at Encyclopædia Britannica

• Forbes, Andrew, & Henley, David: Timur’s Legacy:The Architecture of Bukhara and Samarkand (CPAMedia)

• Narrative of the Embassy of RuyGonzalez De Clavijoto the Court of Timour, at Samarcand, A.D.1403-6– Full text at Google Books.

• Ruy González de Clavijo, Embassy to Tamerlane,1403-1406, translated by Guy Le Strange, with anew Introduction by Caroline Stone (Hardinge Sim-pole, 2009).

• Nationality or Religion: Views of Central Asian Is-lam

16 19 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

19 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

19.1 Text• Timur Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timur?oldid=655737718 Contributors: MichaelTinkler, Mav, David Merrill, Amillar, Andre

Engels, Eclecticology, Danny, XJaM, SimonP, Shii, Olivier, Leandrod, Paul Barlow, Llywrch, Liftarn, Ellywa, Ahoerstemeier, Kricxjo,Jimfbleak, Kingturtle, Bueller 007, John K, JidGom, Frieda, Dcoetzee, Wikiborg, Ed Cormany, Tpbradbury, Itai, Zero0000, Shizhao,Mackensen, Shafei, Robbot, The Phoenix, Peak, Mirv, Yosri, Sverdrup, Rholton, Sunray, Hadal, Jpbrenna, TOO, Gwalla, DocWatson42,Mintleaf, Everyking, Varlaam, Ezhiki, Per Honor et Gloria, Saaga, Macrakis, Dumbo1, Cjensen, Ragib, Golbez, Junkyardprince, Fishal,Pgan002, Calm, Quadell, Ro4444, Untifler, CJCurrie, OwenBlacker, DragonflySixtyseven, Gene s, PFHLai, Fastred, Timothy Usher,DanielZM, Acsenray, The stuart, Lacrimosus, Mike Rosoft, Naryathegreat, Rich Farmbrough, Leibniz, EliasAlucard, Ericamick, Dbach-mann, Bender235, Ttguy, CanisRufus, Poroubalous, Kwamikagami, Gilgamesh he, Wareh, IFaqeer, Bobo192, Vervin, Heian-794, Martey,Boris Živ, Ruszewski, Bontenbal, JW1805, Bill Conn, La goutte de pluie, Jojit fb, Nk, Darwinek, Eritain, Sam Korn, Polylerus, Irish-punktom, Jumbuck, OneGuy, Shirimasen, Alansohn, Sherurcij, Elpincha, Mr Adequate, Bathrobe, Monado, Riana, LRBurdak, Ahruman,Pouya, Goldom, H27kim, Plange, WikiParker, Bart133, TaintedMustard, Kober, Drbreznjev, Ghirlandajo, Zereshk, HenryLi, Kazvor-pal, Tariqabjotu, Stamford, Dejvid, Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ), Woohookitty, FeanorStar7, Lenar, WadeSimMiser, Mississippienne,Kralizec!, JohnC, MarcoTolo, Mtloweman, HiFiGuy, Graham87, Sikandarji, Tokle, Rjwilmsi, Koavf, Саша Стефановић, NatusRoma,Chirags, Kalogeropoulos, Peripatetic, Bhadani, Ian Pitchford, Elmer Clark, RexNL, BitterMan, KASchmidt, Chobot, VolatileChemical, Bg-white, Adoniscik, Vmenkov, Jpfagerback, Roboto de Ajvol, Wavelength, RobotE, Deeptrivia, Kafziel, RussBot, Anichan, Hede2000, KurtLeyman, Ipsen, Gaius Cornelius, Ksyrie, Alex Bakharev, Kennethtennyson, NawlinWiki, Badagnani, Natsymir, Steelhead, Mano1, Ernestofischer, Artereon, Asarelah, AjaxSmack, LostPristinity, Tryphiodorus, Malaise, Whitejay251, Jrajesh, Mehrdadd, E Wing, Sverre, Abune,Dark Tichondrias, Vicarious, Nae'blis, Wikipeditor, Tajik, DVD R W, Sardanaphalus, SmackBot, Elonka, Aflm, Jagged 85, Spasage,Delldot, Kintetsubuffalo, Aivazovsky, Praxio, Markeer, Supersaiyan, Ohnoitsjamie, Choalbaton, Skizzik, Carl.bunderson, Amatulic, Christhe speller, TimBentley, Stubblyhead, Asasa64, MalafayaBot, Hibernian, Afasmit, Bazonka, ImpuMozhi, Not Sure, Avijja, Xeryus, Gyra-dos2009, Eliezg, Ammar shaker, Writtenright, OrphanBot, Jasca Ducato, MM Beamer, Elendil’s Heir, DPSingh, Arab Hafez, Khoikhoi,Kozushi, Downwards, Al-Zaidi, GuillaumeTell, Boray, Nepaheshgar, Ala.foum, -Inanna-, Chew33, DelDav, FlyHigh, SashatoBot, Lam-biam, -Ilhador-, Nishkid64, Jcurtis, Kashk, Equator, Vikas duhan, Kuru, Islami, Gobonobo, Jperrylsu, Shadowlynk, Edwy, Mon Vier,PanBK, Vormund, Comicist, BillFlis, Hvn0413, PlatinumSigma, Mr Stephen, Don Alessandro, Digsdirt, Hectorian, MikeWazowski, An-darielHalo, Grblomerth, Clarityfiend, Frankenab, Geoffg, Whaiaun, Gil Gamesh, Linkspamremover, Khosrow II, The Letter J, Eastlaw,HDCase, CmdrObot, Pukkie, Aherunar, Johnstevens5, WhatDidIDoNow, Rwflammang, Basawala, Cheemaokeree, Reahad, Moreschi,Neelix, Wikism, Paul Chang, Beh-nam, Treybien, Gatoclass, Justin D. Jacobson, Travelbird, Technajunky, Siba, Soetermans, Cra0422,Shirulashem, Dougweller, DumbBOT, Sirmylesnagopaleentheda, PamD, Thijs!bot, Epbr123, Kajisol, Sry85, CynicalMe, Saruwine, Miss-vain, Folantin, Inner Earth, J. W. Love, Nick Number, OuroborosCobra, Qp10qp, AlefZet, Sairakhalid737, Hajji Piruz, Sensemaker,RobotG, Fedayee, Fatidiot1234, Neumannk, Alone Coder, IrishPete, Jj137, WikiLambo, Modernist, Danny kay, Babakexorramdin, Qw-erty Binary, Caecilius, Wahabijaz, JAnDbot, Deflective, Kigali1, Ekabhishek, KonstableBot, Chaucer1387, Ericoides, Scythian1, Scrib-bler357, Hassanfarooqi, Midnightdreary, Igodard, Bpmullins, Twospoonfuls, Lenny Kaufman, WolfmanSF, Bongwarrior, VoABot II,Hb2019, Karkaputto, Kajasudhakarababu, Kizzuwatna, Bigdan201, Deuterium 1, Krynnish Conspiracy, Ecasas8253, Waacstats, B-1yeti,Airknight, Greg Grahame, Omklp, Vssun, Shijualex, E104421, JaGa, Philg88, Markus451, Baristarim, Gun Powder Ma, Chapultepec,Markdf10825, Atulsnischal, Skumarla, Danieliness, Ultraviolet scissor flame, Tbone55, R'n'B, CommonsDelinker, AlexiusHoratius, ZackHolly Venturi, Nono64, J.delanoy, DrKiernan, Trusilver, Jerr, Uncle Dick, Polarbear850, Karcha, Maproom, Jin-Tom, Balthazarduju,Wiki1609, M-le-mot-dit, Kansas Bear, Student7, Joshua Issac, JSarek, Dutchmagnum23, The enemies of god, CardinalDan, Idioma-bot,Funandtrvl, Betterthanbond, Signalhead, Vmaldia, Hugo999, Master z0b, VolkovBot, DSRH, Soliloquial, I-do-do-you?, Abberley2, TXiK-iBoT, Chengiz, Altruism, Cyberscholar, Atabəy, Andres rojas22, Brian Wiseman, Whitem420, Rumiton, TelecomNut, Alborz Fallah,Kmhkmh, ConflictedX3, Burntsauce, Grahamboat, Why Not A Duck, Monty845, AlleborgoBot, Munci, PericlesofAthens, AdRock, Vd-hillon, SieBot, StAnselm, Arvwd, Mycomp, Anoshirawan, Ttony21, Calliopejen1, Caltas, RJaguar3, Guidosst, Mazdakabedi, Hm123,Bentogoa, Immongol, Winkypedia, Colfer2, Hzh, Monkey moejo, Oxymoron83, Yone Fernandes, Lightmouse, Wlegro, Belligero, Ver-dadero, Bananabean, ImageRemovalBot, Martarius, Sergeyukolov, Beeblebrox, ClueBot, UrsusArctosL71, The Thing That Should NotBe, ArdClose, Kafka Liz, Suearcache, Isocephaly, Taquito1, Wysprgr2005, XPTO, Sahib-qiron, Kangourou, Drmies, Sevilledade, Chan-dlerMapBot, Auntof6, Zlerman, Worldkacitizen, 07fan, Excirial, Nostradamus1, Alexbot, Jusdafax, Panyd, PixelBot, Tharizdun, Enerelt,Jebenoyon, Arjayay, Wojwoj, Maniago, Takabeg, SchreiberBike, Staygyro, Ankithreya, Bmn187, Shiand, Catalographer, Aitias, Wk-boonec, BamyanMan, Ano-User, Dupree3, XLinkBot, Kurdo777, BodhisattvaBot, Generalduncan, Dthomsen8, Redman19, SilvonenBot,KgpianAsimov, Addbot, Iiluffyew, Pitt 32, Willking1979, Misaq Rabab, Hotstuf429, Alandeus, Bahamut Star, AndersBot, Debresser,AnnaFrance, LinkFA-Bot, Vyom25, Cmissy, ComradeTimur, Unibond, Lightbot, Ketabtoon, Wikifan12345, Amateur55, Luckas-bot,TheSuave, Yobot, DerechoReguerraz, Ptbotgourou, TaBOT-zerem, Naudefjbot, Jsday187, KamikazeBot, AnakngAraw, Woolagong2388,AnomieBOT, Rubinbot, Jim1138, Piano non troppo, Lecen, Scythian77, Aditya, Westerness, Csigabi, Bluerasberry, Materialscientist,Kapitop, E235, Citation bot, Eumolpo, Gsmgm, TrueColour, Xqbot, Znex, Teamjenn, E-dabdob, Cyphoidbomb, Eagleman205, Grou-choBot, Frosted14, Mloafness, Jacques Ballieu, Omnipaedista, RibotBOT, Lovingisdangerous, Ashrf1979, Mttll, Amaury, Nedim Ardoğa,Moxy, Uratitmouse, Smallman12q, Shadowjams, , Erik9, Ellenois, Vlastimil Svoboda, Nitpyck, FrescoBot, Eagleman99, Tobby72,Urgos, PinkPoison, Dostfarhadjan, Redrose64, Xaghan, Pinethicket, Rayshade, Poliocretes, Mahnut, Khabuul, A8UDI, Jusses2, Fixer88,Σ, Jamesinderbyshire, Shyzad, Deshabhakta, Jeppiz, Torebay, Turkishhistorian, Suuri, Inuit18, Yunshui, Zanhe, Felis domestica, Until-when1, ویکی ,علی Nataev, Lucius Winslow, Diannaa, Lkjhgfdsa 0, Nostalgia of Iran, Tbhotch, Weezerjeepkid, EngineerFromVega,Mean as custard, RjwilmsiBot, TjBot, Ripchip Bot, Axelssj99, AK209, Adam.Adami, , EmausBot, John of Reading, Wikitanvir-Bot, Rarevogel, ZxxZxxZ, Nuel92, FunkyCanute, ZéroBot, DragonTiger23, Abu Shawka, Wieralee, WeijiBaikeBianji, Adil123321, FredGandt, CeeBiscuit, Wayne Slam, HammerFilmFan, Erianna, RaptureBot, Misa123a, Vorziblix, Δ, Tabmaster90, Alamukht, Shrigley, Don-ner60, Jmostly, Mcc1789, Scott Bury, Neil P. Quinn, Ellisun, TRAJAN 117, Sumitkachroo, ClueBot NG, TucsonDavid, Bourton128, Drhilto, Blcksprt, Qadeer294, Cordobaes, Runehelmet, Lysozym, Seair21, Nathaniel Nimrod, Ruslant, Helpful Pixie Bot, Gregj84, Elec-triccatfish2, Huckillberry, DBigXray, Lowercase sigmabot, BG19bot, Sirius2044, Alimirdav, Eladynnus, PhnomPencil, Marcocapelle,Beypeople, Mark Arsten, Chamconc, CarloMartinelli, JDefauw, Mughal Lohar, Soerfm, Stokastik, WarriorsPride6565, Glevum, TheAlmightey Drill, Xooon, Eleanor1944, Winter Gaze, Izzy.neon, Tirgil34, P.Sridhar Babu, BattyBot, Transoxiana, Mediran, SD5bot,BeachHome, Kharadea, Onepebble, Dexbot, Majilis, Bultuushmn, BozokluAdam, Mogism, PT336V, TheIrishWarden, Monticores, Lu-gia2453, Khatary1, VIAFbot, Graphium, Animefreak234, Hylaaper, Zyma, Jaxartes, RotlinkBot, JaviP96, Nimetapoeg, Vanished usersvoinsr8wiraekfiu3rhnsfvr4sb, Royroydeb, Awaisius, Historykid33, Merounge, Meromictic, FiredanceThroughTheNight, Timoer-lenk,WorldCreaterFighter, Soham chamka, Korhanafsar, Avi8tor, Saladin1987, Ugog Nizdast, Interpréteur, Dianska1, Ginsuloft, Dragão Guer-

19.2 Images 17

reiro, Bladesmulti, Shahidmost, Muhammad Umair Mughal, Zeticula, Unka 10, Мунхбат, Retrieverlove, Spivorg, Erim Turukku, Spirit-claymore, Monkbot, JamKaftan, Ahendra, Nestwiki, GinAndChronically, Tiimoora, , Superfluous man, Rawfey, 206Cascadianand Anonymous: 789

19.2 Images• File:Ambox_important.svg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/Ambox_important.svg License: Public do-

main Contributors: Own work, based off of Image:Ambox scales.svg Original artist: Dsmurat (talk · contribs)• File:Autograph_of_Ahmad_ibn_Arabshah.png Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/Autograph_of_

Ahmad_ibn_Arabshah.png License: Public domain Contributors: My own productionPreviously published: http://www.flickr.com/photos/israphil/5653599128/in/photostream/lightbox/ Original artist: Danieliness

• File:Behzad_timur_egyptian.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/Behzad_timur_egyptian.jpg License:Public domain Contributors: تهران معاصر هنرهای موزه Original artist: Assigned to Kamaleddin Behzad

• File:Chlebowski-Bajazyt_w_niewoli.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/Chlebowski-Bajazyt_w_niewoli.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Scanned from album “Malarstwo Polskie w zbiorach za granicą" by StefaniaKrzysztofowicz-Kozakowska, Wydawnictwo Kluszczyński, 2003, ISBN 83-88080-85-7 Original artist: Stanisław Chlebowski

• File:Delhi_after_sack_of_Timur_Lang,_1398.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/Delhi_after_sack_of_Timur_Lang%2C_1398.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Hutchinson’s story of the nations Original artist: Unknown

• File:Gorskii_03978u.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8d/Gorskii_03978u.jpg License: Public domainContributors: This image is available from the United States Library of Congress's Prints and Photographs division under the digital IDppmsc.03978.This tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing for more information.Original artist: Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky

• File:Letter_of_Tamerlane_to_Charles_VI_1402.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b0/Letter_of_Tamerlane_to_Charles_VI_1402.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: [1] Original artist: Timur

• File:Mongolia_in_the_early_15th_century.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/de/Mongolia_in_the_early_15th_century.jpg License: PD Contributors:Zhongguo lishi dituji: 8 Bde., Shanghai: Ditu chubanshe, 1987. And: Zhongguo shigao dituji, Bd. 1, Shanghai: Ditu chubanshe, 1979.Original artist:Louis le Grand

• File:SamarkandGuriAmir.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/SamarkandGuriAmir.jpg License: CC-BY-SA-3.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: Doron

• File:Tamerlane_Besieging_Urganj.JPG Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Tamerlane_Besieging_Urganj.JPG License: Public domain Contributors: https://www.myartprints.co.uk/a/persian-school/tamerlane-1336-1405-besie.htmlOriginal artist: Zafarnama of Sharaf Al-Din 'Ali Yazdi

• File:Teymur.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b2/Teymur.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: http://www.barabass.ru/eng/59.php Original artist: Sharuf ad-din Ali Yesdy

• File:Timur’{}s_army_attacks_Nerges,_Georgia.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/32/Timur%27s_army_attacks_Nerges%2C_Georgia.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Sanat magazine Original artist: Kamāl ud-Dīn Behzād

• File:Timur.jpeg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9b/Timur.jpeg License: Public domain Contributors: http://lectures.edu.ru/default.asp?ob_no=16553 Original artist: Unknown

• File:Timur_Empire.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/Timur_Empire.jpg License: CC BY-SA 3.0Contributors: Own work Original artist: Stuntelaar

• File:Timur_defeats_the_sultan_of_Delhi.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f0/Timur_defeats_the_sultan_of_Delhi.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Imperial Library of Emperor Akbar Original artist: Zafarnama of Sharaf Al-Din'Ali Yazdi

• File:Timur_during_attack_on_Balkh_1370.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Timur_during_attack_on_Balkh_1370.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: British Library Original artist: Mirkhvand’s Rawzat al-Safa

• File:Timur_orders_campaign_against_Georgia.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/Timur_orders_campaign_against_Georgia.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Imperial Library of Emperor Akbar Original artist: Zafarnama ofSharaf Al-Din 'Ali Yazdi

• File:Timur_reconstruction01.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0d/Timur_reconstruction01.jpg License:CC BY-SA 3.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: Shakko

• File:Timur_reconstruction03.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Timur_reconstruction03.jpg License:CC BY-SA 3.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: user:shakko

• File:Timurid_Dynasty_821_-_873_(AH).png Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a2/Timurid_Dynasty_821_-_873_%28AH%29.png License: Public domain Contributors: English Wikipedia Original artist: Arab League at English Wikipedia

• File:Unbalanced_scales.svg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fe/Unbalanced_scales.svg License: Public do-main Contributors: ? Original artist: ?

• File:Wanli_Changcheng-Jiayu_guan.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/Wanli_Changcheng-Jiayu_guan.jpg License: CC-BY-SA-3.0 Contributors: Originally from zh.wikipedia; description page is/was here. Original artist: Original up-loader was Huowax at zh.wikipedia

19.3 Content license• Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0