The successors of Genghis Khan — the great khans who ruled the Mongol Empire after his death in 1227 — were among the most powerful rulers in the history of the world. Under their leadership, the Mongol Empire reached the height of its territorial extent, and the institutions created by Genghis Khan were carried across the Eurasian world. The successors of Genghis Khan included Ögedei Khan (r. 1229-1241), Güyük Khan (r. 1246-1248), Möngke Khan (r. 1251-1259), and Kublai Khan (r. 1260-1294), each of whom made a distinctive contribution to the development of the Mongol state.
The successors of Genghis Khan faced a number of major challenges: the consolidation of the empire, the management of the vast territories that the empire had conquered, the resolution of succession disputes, and the adaptation of the imperial institutions to the cultures of the subject populations. The way in which they responded to these challenges shaped the course of the Mongol world for the next century and a half, and it was a major factor in the long-term success of the Mongol state.
Ögedei Khan (r. 1229-1241)
Ögedei Khan, the third son of Genghis Khan, was the second great khan of the Mongol Empire. He was designated as Genghis Khan’s successor at a kurultai held shortly before the latter’s death, and he was elected great khan at a kurultai in 1229. Under his rule, the Mongol armies conquered Russia, Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, Persia, much of the Middle East, Korea, and parts of China. The Mongol postal system, the yam, was expanded into a continental network under his rule, and the foundations of the Mongol administrative system were laid.
Ögedei was an effective administrator and a steady general, but he was also an indulgent man, with a strong love of hunting, drinking, and feasting. He is reported to have held enormous feasts at his court, with hundreds of guests and thousands of servants. The feasts were an important part of the imperial tradition, and they served to bind the Mongol ruling class together. Ögedei was also a patron of culture, and he is reported to have maintained a large collection of painters, musicians, and poets at his court.
Ögedei died on 11 December 1241, while on a hunting trip near the Orkhon River. The cause of his death is not entirely clear, but it was probably a combination of alcoholism and the strain of overwork. His death was a major blow to the Mongol Empire, and the succession crisis that followed was the first major political crisis of the unified Mongol state.
Güyük Khan (r. 1246-1248)
Güyük Khan, the son of Ögedei, was the third great khan of the Mongol Empire. He was elected at a kurultai in 1246, after a delay of several years that was caused by internal squabbles. The election was a controversial one, and Güyük’s reign was marked by political tension between the different branches of the imperial family.
Güyük was reportedly an unpopular ruler, with a reputation for cruelty and a tendency to suspect his relatives of treason. He was determined to reassert the authority of the central khanate over the various khanates, and he attempted to launch a campaign against the Ilkhanate in Persia and the Golden Horde in Russia. The campaign was abandoned when Güyük died in 1248, possibly of illness, possibly of poison.
Güyük’s reign was short and troubled, but it was also significant for the diplomatic relations that he maintained with the Western powers. Güyük sent letters to the Pope and to the King of France, in which he demanded that they submit to Mongol rule. The letters were not well received, but they were a sign of the reach of the Mongol Empire and of the diplomatic pretensions of the great khans.
Möngke Khan (r. 1251-1259)
Möngke Khan, the eldest son of Tolui and the grandson of Genghis Khan, was the fourth great khan of the Mongol Empire. He was elected at a kurultai in 1251, in an election that was strongly supported by the Toluid princes and that has been widely regarded as a Toluid coup. The election marked the beginning of Toluid dominance in the imperial politics, and it set the stage for the Toluid Civil War of 1260-1264.
Möngke was an able and determined ruler. Under his rule, the Mongol invasions of the Song Dynasty in southern China, the conquest of the Abbasid Caliphate in Baghdad, and the Mongol invasion of Hungary and Poland were all carried out. Möngke was also an important administrative reformer, and he expanded the imperial administration and improved the postal system.
Möngke died in 1259, while on campaign in southern China. The cause of his death is not entirely clear, but it was probably a combination of illness and the strain of the campaign. His death left the throne vacant, and the succession crisis that followed was the central political event of the mid-thirteenth century. The crisis eventually led to the Toluid Civil War of 1260-1264, in which Kublai Khan defeated his younger brother Ariq Böke and established the Toluid line as the ruling line of the empire.
Kublai Khan (r. 1260-1294)
Kublai Khan, the grandson of Genghis Khan and the son of Tolui, was the fifth great khan of the Mongol Empire and the founder of the Yuan Dynasty in China. He was elected great khan at a kurultai in Shangdu in 1260, in an election that was disputed by rival branches of the family for decades afterward. Kublai eventually won the Toluid Civil War against his younger brother Ariq Böke, and he was the unquestioned ruler of the eastern part of the empire by 1264.
Kublai was one of the most important figures in the history of the Mongol world. He was a sophisticated, multilingual ruler with a strong interest in Chinese culture, and he was committed to the idea of a Yuan Dynasty that combined Mongol military power with Chinese administrative experience. He made his capital at Khanbaliq (modern Beijing) and adopted many features of the Chinese imperial system, including the title of emperor and the apparatus of the Confucian bureaucracy. The Yuan Dynasty that he founded in 1271 was the wealthiest and most populous of the four major khanates, and it was the cultural and political center of the Mongol world for the next century.
Kublai was also famous for his patronage of the arts, his support for Tibetan Buddhism, and his open-mindedness to foreign visitors. The most famous of the foreign visitors was Marco Polo, the Venetian merchant who spent more than two decades at the Yuan court and who wrote an influential account of his experiences. Kublai died in 1294, and the Yuan Dynasty that he had founded lasted until 1368, when it was overthrown by the Chinese Ming Dynasty.
The Significance of the Successors
The successors of Genghis Khan made a number of major contributions to the development of the Mongol state. They expanded the empire to its maximum territorial extent, established the administrative institutions that would be the basis of the empire for the next century and a half, and adapted the imperial institutions to the cultures of the subject populations. They also presided over the major political crises of the thirteenth century, including the succession disputes that led to the Toluid Civil War and the fragmentation of the empire into four khanates.
The successors of Genghis Khan are also significant for the long-term legacy of the Mongol Empire. The institutions that they established — the postal system, the imperial administration, the religious toleration, the decimal military structure — survived the decline of the empire and continued to shape the political life of Eurasia for centuries. The successor khanates of the Mongol world — the Yuan Dynasty in China, the Ilkhanate in Persia, the Golden Horde in Russia, and the Chagatai Khanate in Central Asia — ruled large parts of Eurasia until the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and the political traditions of the empire are still visible in the modern world.
Sources
- John Man, Genghis Khan: Life, Death and Legacy (London, 2004).
- Igor de Rachewiltz, ed., The Secret History of the Mongols (2 vols., Brill, 2004–2013).
- Paul Ratchnevsky, Genghis Khan: His Life and Legacy (Oxford, 1991).