With the death of Khubilai Khan in 1294, Mongol rule in China passed to his grandson Temur Oljeitu (d. 1307). He largely carried out Khubilai’s policies, though he ended plans for another attack on Japan and Vietnam. The Chinese Mongol emperors ruled only China and the Mongol homeland.
Temur Oljeitu had several successors in just a short period. They faced a familiar problem: balancing the interests of Mongol princes who favored traditional Mongolian customs with the interests of the pro-Chinese Mongols and the Chinese themselves. One positive change came for the Chinese who followed the ideas of Confucius. The emperor Ayurbar-wada (d. 1320) brought back the old civil service exam system (see page 34). Of all the Mongol rulers of the Yuan Dynasty, he was one of the most comfortable with Chinese culture, and was able to speak and read Chinese.
A period of turmoil began in 1322, when Shidebala (d. 1322), Ayur-barwada’s son, was assassinated. Various members of the Mongol royal family and their Chinese supporters competed for power, erupting in 10 years of civil war. Finally, in 1333, the last Mongol ruler in China emerged. Toghan Temur (d. 1368) was 13 years old when he took the throne. He reigned for 35 years-the longest since Khubilai-but faced many problems.
The Influence of the Lamas
Ayurbarwada and Shide-bala were given the titles Buyantu ("meritorius") and Gegen ("shining"), respectively, in Mongo-lian. They also had Chinese names when they came to power: Ayurbarwada was called Renzong and his son was known as Yingzong. Today they are often called by the Sanskrit names used here. Sanskrit was one of the first languages used to write down Buddhist texts. The Mongols' use of Sanskrit names shows the influence of the Tibetan lamas at the Yuan royal court.
China was hit with serious floods and epidemics during Toghan Temur’s reign. But some of his problems stemmed from Mongol rule and the Chinese reaction to it. Many people of southern China had never truly accepted the Mongols. They also resented the growing power of the local officials who taxed them and basically ran their lives. In 1325, peasants in the south revolted, and by the 1340s groups of armed bandits were taking control of southern towns, sometimes working with local governments. The power of the central government in the south weakened, leading to the growth of regional governments with their own informal armies. Going into the 1350s, the emperor and his supporters controlled the region around Khan-baliq, but not much else.
Toghan Temur and his generals had trouble resisting the growing threat to their rule. They could not recruit troops from the Mongol homeland because its population had fallen during the 14th century due to earlier wars and the need for Mongol soldiers in other parts of the empire. Toghan Temur added to his problems by relying on warlords to defend his empire; these generals were more concerned with winning power at one another’s expense than they were with maintaining the empire.
The rebels also sometimes fought among themselves, slowing their efforts to drive out the Mongols. By 1356, however, a Chinese peasant soldier named Zhu Yuanzhang (1328-1398) emerged as the leader of a unified rebel army. As a boy, Zhu studied Buddhism and learned to read and write, giving him more education than the average peasant. He first led a small band of rebels, then defeated competing rebel bands to gain power. He eventually became the founder of the next Chinese dynasty, the Ming. Zhu established his own government in Nanjing, in southeastern China, then slowly moved his forces northward. During this time, the Mongol warlords continued to fight with one another, which kept them from launching an effective counterattack in the south.
In 1368, as Zhu’s armies neared Khan-baliq, Toghan Temur escaped north to Shangdu before fleeing toward Mongolia. Legend says six tumens-60,000 Mongols-joined him, but this is difficult to confirm. Others stayed in China for several more years, trying to hold off the rebels, but the Chinese regained complete control of their country by 1382. Some Mongols remained in China and were absorbed into the population.
Although defeated, Toghan Temur did not give up his claim to be the emperor of China. After his death in 1370, his son and grandson tried to reassert Mongol authority from a base in northern China. The Chinese, however, forced the Mongols to retreat to their homeland. Another battle in 1387 led to a devastating Mongol defeat, and the Chinese eventually destroyed the old Mongol capital of Karakorum.
In 1399, the last of Khubilai’s descendants to claim the authority to rule China was assassinated. Other Mongol leaders began competing for power in and around Mongolia. In the west of Mongolia, a group of Mongols called the Oirat began to develop a mini-empire. Mongols who still claimed family ties to Chinggis rose to power in the east. As the two groups struggled for power, the Chinese tried to take advantage, launching an attack in the early 1400s. The Chinese won a major battle in 1410, but within 15 years the eastern Mongols were raiding China, which led to a huge Chinese counterattack on Mongolia. The invasion did not destroy the eastern Mongols, however.
With the eastern Mongols weakened, the Oirat tried to build a united Mongol state. Their relations with China wavered; at times the Ming emperors seemed friendly, but ultimately the Chinese did not want a strong Mongol presence on their border. In 1439, the Oirat leader Esen (d. 1455) came to power. He married into Chinggis’s family to claim some ties to the former Great Khan, then gained control over the other Mongol tribes. In 1449, Esen led an invasion of China and his troops captured the Ming emperor Zhu Zhizhen (r. 1436-1449). The modern historians Wood-bridge Bingham, Hilary Conroy, and Fred Ilke, in A History of Asia, say the captured emperor “sat serenely, showing no emotions whatsoever among 100,000 Chinese corpses and his
More Bricks in the Wall
Ming Dynasty emperors began rebuilding the Great Wall, an unconnected series of low defensive earthworks running across northern China, in 1470. New sections were added, old sections were fortified, and isolated sections were connected. They hoped the rebuilt and strengthened wall would hold back the Mongols and other raiders from the steppes. The Great Wall that still exists in China dates from this period. Today the Great Wall stretches for more than 4,200 miles as it zigzags across northern China.
Slaughtered bodyguard.” The Ming decided not to try to get their kidnapped emperor back. Instead, they named a new emperor and continued to fight the Mongols.
But Esen’s war in China stirred up trouble within his own empire, as the eastern Mongolians preferred not to fight the Chinese, fearing the costs were too high for too unlikely a prize. Esen’s assassination in 1455 sparked a civil war. Finally, an eastern Mongol named Dayan Khan (d. c. 1517), a descendant of the family of Khubilai Khan, came to power around 1480. Under him and his grandson Altan Khan (1507-1583), the eastern Mongols took back much of the traditional Mongol homeland from China. More important for future developments in Mongolia, Altan Khan made Tibetan Buddhism the nation’s official religion.
Two"Universal" Leaders
The Mongol title dalai was first given to a Tibetan lama by Altan Khan. Dalai is a Mongolian word meaning "vast sea" or "great ocean." It is similar to Chinggis's title, which means "oceanic" (universal), so the Dalai Lama was also considered a "universal" leader. The Tibetans believe that each Dalai Lama is the reincarnation of the first one proclaimed by the Mongol khan. Today, the head of Tibetan Buddhism is the 14th Dalai Lama. Reflecting the close cultural link between the Mongols and the Tibetans, Tibetan Buddhism (sometimes called Lamaism) is still the major religion in Mongolia.
The 14th Dalai Lama is the head of Tibetan Buddhism.
World History
