Genghis Khan

Genghis Khan (birth name — Temujin), 1155 – 1227. Mongolian Khan, great commander and conqueror, founder of the Mongol Empire (13th-14th centuries.)

History

Temujin came from a noble Mongolian family — Bordjigin: his ancestors were khans, but after his father’s death the family lost their power. In his youth, Temujin was pursued by enemies; he fell into captivity many times and narrowly escaped death. When he grew up and having withstood the long struggle with his rivals, he was able to subdue the Mongol tribes. In 1206, Temujin was proclaimed the supreme ruler and took the title Genghis Khan at the Kurultai (the meeting of the nomadic elite). “Genghis” translates as “strong.”

Genghis Khan created a model army of his time: it had a clear structure and strict discipline. Each man knew his place in the hierarchy. He issued “The Great Yasa” — a strict set of rules and laws under which cowardice, misconduct, and failure to assist others in the battle were immediately punished by death. The conquered people were willing to join Genghis Khan’s army and also obeyed the harsh “Yasa”. Such rigid administration ensured Genghis Khan a whole series of victories and conquests, so that neither the harsh conditions of a nomadic life, nor the climate, nor the resistance could stop him.

After gaining authority over the Mongols, Genghis Khan began the conquest of neighbouring territories, and then the whole world. He believed that his authority over it was approved by the Great Blue Sky. In 1206 – 1210, Mongols destroyed Merkits, conquered Naimans and Buryats, defeated the states of the Kara-Khitai and the Yenisei Kyrgyz (Mongolia, Altai, and South Siberia). In 1211, Genghis Khan attacked the Chinese Qin Empire — and within three years he conquered the Northeast China.

In 1219, Genghis Khan was nicknamed “the Shaker of the Universe” led his troops to the west. The rich Central Asia, Iran, and Georgia could not resist the onslaught of his armies — the Mongols conquered and destroyed cities (including Samarkand, Bukhara, and Merv) and devastated caravanserais. In 1223, they defeated the Russian and Polovtsian army in the battle on the river Kalka. Thus, by the end of his life, Genghis Khan was the ruler of the empire stretching across vast lands (besides Mongolia itself), including North China, East Turkestan, all of Central Asia, the steppes from the Irtysh River to the Volga River, a large part of Iran, and the Caucasus. Genghis Khan’s empire was one of the greatest empires in the history of mankind.

Not stopping there, Khan started a campaign against the Tanguts who inhabited Northern China. The commander and conqueror died during that campaign. His sons divided the great empire into Uluses and subsequently failed to keep it united.

The Stone

The stonecutters present a balanced interpretation of the image. The viewer sees a man full of calm confidence in his decisions and actions. An important role in this interpretation belongs to the “muted” palette determined by the selection of stones: it contains very few colours and is devoid of overly bright highlights.

The great conqueror’s attire, the blanket in the form of wolf skin, and his horse are made of different varieties of agate, and one should take a closer look at the way and nuances of tooling of the minerals. The hat of polar fox fur is cut from moss agate chosen with great precision in such a way that one of the tails of the furry animal that adorn the headdress has a very realistic looking white spot at the end. Taking note of this peculiarity, the craftsmen used it for amore realistic look of the part. Dark agate with grey and reddish spots was used for making the robe: the low relief pattern is delicately carved to match the pattern of the stone, gently emphasizing the coloured spots on the stone.

The same technique was used with the more contrasting stone that the pants were carved from: the edge of each leg is marked with a bright red stripe accented with carved lines and shading. The relief decoration of the saddle made of golden coloured stone with a contrasting pattern is designed in the same manner. To carve the wolf skin covering the back of the horse, the masters turned to laminated, almost opaque agate. This allowed them to convey various shades of grey strands and curls of hair at the base of the hind paw very convincingly. The skilful use of contrasting light ochre inclusions in the brownish-orange agate is especially obvious in the horse’s tail.

Genghis Khan’s stately horse stands calmly on the pedestal shaped as a hemisphere, symbolizing the scope of his conquests: he submitted half of the world. The pattern of the dark jasper that the water surface is cut from, is reminiscentof the sea ripples and waves. The land made of brownish-yellow granular aventurine from the Taganay deposit gives the impression of a sandy desert. This three-dimensional mosaic piece is part of a mosaic triptych “The Conquerors” dedicated to founders of vast empires.