Tamerlane (also Tamberlaine; 1336-1405) was a fiery, charismatic, brutal Mongol ruler who attempted to reclaim Genghis Khan’s empire in the fourteenth century. His bloody reign inspired poetry from such later writers as Christopher Marlowe, Lord Byron, and Edgar Allan Poe.
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| Tamerlane |
He was born Timur Leng in 1336 in Shahr-i-Sabz, south of Samarkand, the son of a Turk commander. As a young man, he injured himself in a sheep-raiding accident, and "'as unable to bend his right knee or raise his right arm ever again. This earned him the nickname Timur the Lame, which became Tamerlane. Mongol power in Transoxiana had been significantly reduced from the days of Genghis Kan, as various factions sought to assert leadership. Tamerlane claimed he was Genghis's descendant, but there is no evidence to support this, although apparently two of his four wives were related to Genghis. In 1361, Tamerlane became chieftain of the Timurid tribe. With Amir Husayn, his brother-in-law, Tamerlane began defending the Timurids against the dominating Chingisid tribe. Within a decade he defeated the Chingsids, and later Husayn's army itself. Tamerlane named himself sole ruler of Transoxiana in 1369. He saw himself as having been selected by God to lead, having been born during the conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars.
