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Möngke Khan
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Möngke Khan (???? ????), also transliterated as Mongke, Mongka, Möngka, Mangu or Mangku (; c. 1208–1259), was the fourth Great Khan of the Mongol Empire from 1251 to 1259. He was the son of Tolui and Sorghaghtani Beki, brother of Hulagu and Kublai Khan, and a grandson of Genghis Khan.
"Monkh" literally means "eternal" in the Mongolian language.
Early life
Möngke first appears in the European campaign of 1236-1242. He personally led the attack against the Kypchak and Alan chiefdoms in the Caucasus and destroyed the Alani capital at Maghas.
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Encyclopedia
Möngke Khan (???? ????), also transliterated as Mongke, Mongka, Möngka, Mangu or Mangku (; c. 1208–1259), was the fourth Great Khan of the Mongol Empire from 1251 to 1259. He was the son of Tolui and Sorghaghtani Beki, brother of Hulagu and Kublai Khan, and a grandson of Genghis Khan.
"Monkh" literally means "eternal" in the Mongolian language.
Early life
Möngke first appears in the European campaign of 1236-1242. He personally led the attack against the Kypchak and Alan chiefdoms in the Caucasus and destroyed the Alani capital at Maghas. He also oversaw the sacking of the Italian ports in Crimea in 1239. Later he played a major role in the Russian campaign under his cousin Batu, besieged the city of Kiev. Impressed by its splendour, he unsuccessfully demanded its submission in order to save it. He also fought with Batu at the Battle of Mohi. In the summer of 1241, before the premature end of the campaign, Möngke returned home.
Having subdued Hungary, the Mongols were preparing to invade Austria and Germany, but the death of Mongol ruler Ogedei Khan in 1241 forced all the princes of the blood to return to Mongolia to decide the succession. As expected, Ogedei's son Guyuk was named as successor, but Batu, who favored his favorite cousin Mongke to be Great Khan, delayed his consent, leading to a regency by Ogedei's widow Toregene Khatun.
Guyuk was also paranoid that someone would try to overthrow him, and had several senior Mongol leaders seized and executed. Finally in 1248, his suspicion turned to Batu, and he demanded Batu come meet him in Mongolia for consultations, which was widely understood to mean that Batu would be arrested and probably executed. Batu had no choice but to heed the command, but for safety he brought his entire army with him, and civil war seemed inevitable.
But Guyuk died in route to the meeting, which left his widow, Oghul Qaimish, in charge as regent. Batu then outmaneuvered Oghul by joining forces with Mongke's mother Sorghaghtani Beki to call a grand council of all the Mongol leaders in Siberia in 1250, whereat everyone's favorite, Mongke, was duly elected Great Khan.
Reign
Shortly thereafter, Oghul's son Khoja and Ogedei's favorite grandson Shiremun came to "pay homage" to Mongke as the new ruler, but they brought the entire army of the Ogedei faction with them, so everyone knew the Ogedeids and the Chagadaids were planning to attack him. Mongke and Batu's brother Berke therefore arranged to have Oghul accused of using black magic against Mongke, and she was arrested, sewn up into a sack, and tossed into a river and drowned (which was the traditional Mongol punishment for using black magic).
In 1252-1259, Möngke conducted a census of the Mongol Empire including Persia, Georgia, Armenia, Russia and North China. There was an uprising in Novgorod against Mongol rule in 1257, but Alexander Nevsky forced the city to submit to Mongol census and taxation. During his reign, the French king Louis IX sent William Rubruck as a diplomat seeking an alliance with the Mongols against the Mamluk Sultanate
As khan, Möngke seemed to take the legacy of world conquest he had inherited much more seriously than did Güyük. Möngke concerned himself more with the war in China, outflanking the Song Dynasty through the conquest of Yunnan in 1254 and an invasion of Indochina, which allowed the Mongols to invade from north, west, and south. Tran Dynasty accepted terms of the temporary vassalage and sent tributes to the administration of Mongke. Taking personal command late in the decade, he captured many of the fortified cities along the northern front. These actions made conquest inevitable. Möngke dispatched his brother Hulagu to the southwest, an act which was to expand the Mongol Empire to the gates of Egypt. European conquest was neglected due to the primacy of the other two theaters, but Möngke's friendliness with Batu ensured the unity of the empire.
Death
While conducting the war in China at Fishing Town in modern-day Chongqing, Möngke died near the site of the siege on August 11, 1259.
There are several different accounts as to how he perished. Generally recorded as died of dysentery or even a cholera epidemic. He's also reported to have been killed by an arrow shot from a Chinese archer during the siege. Other accounts claim that he was killed in action by a stone launched from a Song Chinese trebuchet,.
In any case, his death led to the 4-year succession war between his two younger brothers: Kublai Khan and Ariq Boke. Though Kublai Khan eventually won the battle against Ariq Boke, the succession war essentially marked the end of a unified Mongol empire. When Kublai Khan established the Yuan Dynasty in China in 1271, Möngke Khan was placed on the official record of the dynasty as Xianzong . Thus, Möngke Khan is usually referred to as Yuan Xianzong in Chinese historiography.
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