Temujin’s rise to supreme leader was neither smooth nor in any way assured. The break with his boyhood anda, Jamuka, is often cited as the event that signified the real start of his pursuit of power. Jamuka was also singularly ambitious, and the two would have scented in each other a dangerous rival. This rivalry split them as it would also split the Mongol tribes, and as this rivalry intensified both knew that there could be only one ultimate winner and that the price of losing would be dire.
Eighteen months after their successful campaign against the Merkits, the two andas broke camp and went their separate ways. Jamuka, as the legitimate ruler of the Jadarat tribe, could expect support from the more conservative and traditionalist Mongol elements, who upheld the solidarity of the nobility and the constitution of the tribe. Temujin, whose noble lineage had been effectively severed by the defection of his own tribe following his father’s death, relied on personal loyalty and on those who would question the traditional tribal hierarchy or who sought refuge from the claims and strictures of clan and bondage. The night that Temujin swept away from the andas’ shared camp, he was followed by a defecting detachment of Jamuka’s men. Temujin’s reputation as a just and generous master who inspired and rewarded loyalty was growing. Those who joined his ranks came as individuals or in small groups, often defying their leaders who generally remained supportive of Jamuka. Among those groups who rallied to Temujin’s banner were ancestral subject tribes, otogus bo’ol, such as the Jalair, the Soldu, and the Baya’ut. Individual serfs, otogu bo’ol, were also welcomed, with the result that representatives from all the tribes and from every level of tribal society could be found within Temujin’s following.
With a growing power base of loyal followers and even talk of a heavenly mandate, Temujin could now realistically aspire to leadership of the steppe tribes. He was proclaimed khan15 by his supporters in 1185, even though many of them outranked him in the tribal hierarchy.
We will make you khan,
And when you are khan
We shall gallop after all your enemies,
Bring you girls and women of good complexion,
Bring palace-tents and foreign girls with cheeks Like silk, bring geldings at the trot,
And give them to you.16
Whereas Toghrul, the ong-khan of the Keraits, offered his congratulations to the new khan, Jamuka was determined to thwart his former anda’s ambitions, and using the pretext of revenge for an executed horse-thief, he rode at the head of 30,000 men from 14 tribes against his one-time brother. Temujin was defeated and fled to the higher reaches of the Onon River. Behind him he abandoned some of his men to Jamuka’s mercy—but Jamuka showed none. The unfortunates were boiled alive in 70 vats,17 and their two leaders were decapitated, their heads later used as tail-adornment on Jamuka’s horse. This action would seal Jamuka’s eventual fate.
Before he could regroup and counterattack, however, Temujin was summoned to the aid of his patron, the Kerait ong-khan. Temujin’s defeat at the hands of Jamuka had repercussions throughout the Turco-Mongol tribes, one of which was the toppling from power of Toghrul, and Temujin’s once-powerful patron was forced into exile under the protection of the Kara-Khitai.
In fact mystery surrounds this whole period in the sources, and a certain amount of conjecture is necessary to ascertain the events clearly. In his authoritative biography, Paul Ratchnevsky surmises that Temujin was held, possibly as a captive, at the Chin court following his defeat by Ja-muka. Toghrul had ruled with the acquiescence of the Altan Khan (“Golden Khan”), as the nomads called the Chin emperor, and he would not have welcomed the Chinese ruler’s downfall. When the Tatars, the Chins’ acting police force during this obscure decade between 1186 and 1196, fell foul of the Altan Khan, Temujin was on hand to offer his services and at the same time take some revenge for his father’s murder. Whether Toghrul took part in the battle against the Tatars is disputed in the sources, but as a result of the victory Temujin was awarded a title by the Chin emperor, and Toghrul, now an old man, had his title wang-khan confirmed and his leadership of the Keraits restored. By 1197 Temujin and the wang-khan18 were therefore both restored to positions of prestige and power.
Temujin was content at this time to serve as the wang-khan’s protege, and their alliance brought success to both the Mongols and the Keraits. Jamuka continued to inspire envy and hatred against Temujin’s growing prestige, and discontented Merkits, Naimans, Tayichi’uts, Unggirats, and remnants of the Tatars allied against him. The climax to this steppe war pitting Temujin and Toghrul against an alliance loosely gathered under Jamuka, who had been hastily elected gurkhan (khan of all the tribes) in 1201, was reached in 1201-2 in the foothills of the eastern Khinghan mountains. Temujin secured a victory over the confederation and followed it up by forcing a confrontation the following year near the Khalkha River with his old, hated enemy. This bloody battle resulted in the massacre and near extermination of the Tatars, final revenge for the murder of Temujin’s father, Yesugei.
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