 |
    
|
|
|
|
|
 Tamerlane
(1336-1405), Turkmen Mongol conqueror, who established an empire extending
from India to the Mediterranean Sea. The name Tamerlane, a European corruption
of Timur Lang ("Timur the Lame") was given to him because his left side
was partially disabled. Tamerlane was born April 10, 1336, at Kesh in Transoxiana
(present-day Shakhrisyabz, Uzbekistan), and rose to prominence in the service
of the Jagataid khan Tughluq Timur. Between 1364 and 1370 he won control
of Transoxiana, and in the latter year declared the restoration of the
empire of Genghis Khan, whom he falsely claimed as his ancestor. By 1394
he had conquered Iran, Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Georgia. In 1389-95 he
fought and weakened the Khanate of the Golden Horde. In 1398 Tamerlane
invaded India, where he captured Delhi and massacred its inhabitants. In
1401 he took Syria from the Mamelukes, and the following year defeated
the Ottoman sultan Bayazid I. Tamerlane died on February 18, 1405, near
Shymkent (in present-day Kazakstan) while leading an expedition against
China, and was buried in Samarqand, his capital city. His mausoleum, the
Gur-e Amir, is one of Samarqand's great architectural monuments. Although
he was notorious for his cruelty in war and for the many atrocities committed
by his armies, Tamerlane was also a lover of scholarship and the arts.
His dynasty, the Timurids, which ruled Transoxiana and Iran until the early
16th century, was noted for its patronage of Turkish and Persian literature.
One of his descendants, Babur, founded the Mughal dynasty of India in 1526.
He is the protagonist of Christopher Marlowe's dramatic epic, Tamburlaine
the Great (1590). Source: Microsoft Encarta 97 |
Images of Amir Timur
TEMPLE
OF TIMUR THE GREAT