In approximately 1162 A.D., a baby boy named Temujin was born to the noble family of Yesugei and Ho’elun, somewhere between the grassy plains north of the Gobi Desert and south of the Siberian forests (modern day Mongolia). Legend has it that baby Temujin was born clutching a blood clot the size of a knucklebone, and that all efforts to pry open his determined little hands were in vain. However, despite his precocious beginnings, not even his fierce and proud warrior father could have anticipated that his son would one day become the founder, ruler (Khan) and Emperor (Khagan) of the Mongol Empire, the largest contiguous empire in history. Alexander the Great, Hannibal and Julius Caesar can all step aside, cause they just got served by Genghis Khan!

Genghis Khan rose to power by uniting many of the nomadic tribes that peopled northeast Asia. This was no easy task; the Mongol people were illiterate, fragmented and perhaps no more than 700,000 in number. They moved about in small bands headed by a chief or khan, living in portable felt tents that could not have provided much protection against the elements. Moreover, describing the geography of Mongolia as ‘inhospitable’ would be akin to calling Hitler a ‘mean person.’ A landlocked “No Man’s Land,” Mongolia contains almost no arable land and much of its area is covered by steppes (a grassland plain without trees), with jagged mountains to the north and west and the Gobi Desert to the South (classified as a cold desert). High, cold and dry, it has an extreme climate with long frigid winters, short summers and almost no rain. As a result, scarcity and deprivation were (and continue to be) an everyday reality for the Mongols, which exacerbated inter-tribal conflict and facilitated ceaseless turf wars.

Genghis Khan was no saint by even the most flexible of standards; terror was his greatest weapon and he was remorseless towards those who were stupid enough to cross him. Resisting the Mongol army was an act of suicide, and entire populations of cities that dared to resist the Khan were slaughtered indiscriminately, with the Mongol armies to buffer counterattacks: human shields nearly eight centuries before Saddam Hussein. Cities that surrendered without a fight were spared, their citizens merely enslaved.

Despite committing his fair share of mortal sins, Genghis Khan’s place in the history books was not won through bloodshed alone. He enacted many progressive laws that improved the status of women, including outlawing the kidnapping of women and the selling of women into marriage. He also declared all children “legitimate” under the law, regardless of the mother’s marital status. However, Genghis Khan’s most important non-military achievement was the introduction of a writing system based on the Uighur script (still used in inner Mongolia today) to his then-illiterate people.

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