The Toluid Civil War of 1260 to 1264 was won by Kublai Khan, the grandson of Genghis Khan and the son of Tolui. Kublai’s victory established the Toluid branch of the imperial family as the ruling line of the Mongol Empire, and it marked the beginning of the era of the four khanates and the end of the unified Mongol state.
The war was fought between Kublai Khan and his younger brother Hulagu, on one side, and a coalition of Ögedeid, Chagataid, and other conservative princes, on the other. The conservative coalition had been led by the Ögedeid prince Kaidu and the Chagataid prince Alghu, with Ariq Böke, the youngest son of Tolui, as their preferred candidate for the throne.
The Course of the War
The war was a long, complicated affair that was fought in three main theaters. The first theater was the Mongolian heartland, where Ariq Böke, supported by a number of conservative Mongol princes, attempted to hold the central territories against the forces of Kublai. The second theater was China, where Kublai’s son and lieutenants fought to secure the agricultural south against the forces loyal to Ariq Böke. The third theater was Persia, where Hulagu supported his brother Kublai against Ariq Böke and against the Ögedeid and Chagataid princes who were trying to detach the Ilkhanate from the central empire.
The decisive engagement of the war was the Battle of the Orchun in 1261, in which Kublai’s general Liu Xuan defeated the forces of Ariq Böke and forced the rival khan to retreat to the southern steppe. The war dragged on for several more years, but the Battle of the Orchun marked the turning point, and Ariq Böke’s coalition began to fall apart.
The Surrender of Ariq Böke
By 1264, the major supporters of Ariq Böke had switched sides or had been defeated, and Ariq Böke himself surrendered to Kublai. Kublai, in a display of clemency that was widely noted, pardoned his brother rather than executing him; Ariq Böke died in captivity a few months later, possibly of illness.
The surrender of Ariq Böke marked the end of the civil war and the beginning of the Toluid era. Kublai was recognized as the great khan by the majority of the imperial family, and the khanate of Persia, the Golden Horde, and the Chagatai Khanate were forced to accept his suzerainty. The political unity of the empire was not restored, but the Toluid branch of the family was established as the senior line of the imperial house, and the descendants of Tolui would rule the empire (in the form of the Yuan Dynasty in China) for the next century.
The Consequences of the Toluid Victory
The Toluid victory had profound consequences for the Mongol Empire. It established the Toluid line as the ruling line of the empire, and it effectively ended the political claims of the Ögedeid and Chagataid branches. It accelerated the fragmentation of the empire into four khanates, and it marked the beginning of the era of the khanates. It also established the precedent that the great khan would have to be a Toluid, and the right of the Toluid line to rule the empire would be recognized by the other khanates for the next century.
The Toluid victory was not, however, a complete victory. Kublai was unable to bring the Golden Horde, the Chagatai Khanate, or the Ilkhanate under his direct control, and the khanates continued to function as semi-independent states. The political unity of the empire was preserved in name only, and the actual political reality was one of four separate khanates, each with its own political and cultural trajectory. The Toluid victory was, in this sense, a Pyrrhic victory: it established the Toluid line as the ruling line, but it was unable to restore the political unity of the empire.
Sources
- David Morgan, The Mongols (2nd ed., Oxford, 2007).
- Peter Jackson, The Mongols and the West, 1221–1410 (London, 2005).
- Timothy May, The Mongol Conquests in World History (London, 2012).