Timur Khwaja
Timur Khwaja in later Russian chronicle.
Khan of the Golden Horde
Western Half (Blue Horde)
Reign1361
PredecessorKhiḍr Khan
SuccessorOrdu Malik
DiedAugust/September 1361
DynastyBorjigin
FatherKhiḍr Khan
ReligionIslam

Timur Khwaja (Persian: تیمور خواجه; Turki/Kypchak: تمور خواجه‎) was briefly Khan of the Golden Horde in 1361, having succeeded his father Khiḍr Khan.

The forceful Khiḍr Khan, a descendant of Jochi's son Shiban according to the Tawārīḫ-i guzīdah-i nuṣrat-nāmah,[1] asserted himself as ruler of the Golden Horde in June 1360, having eliminated his rival Nawruz Beg. Nevertheless, the new khan's authority was limited by the presumable autonomy of the former beglerbeg Mamai Kiyat in the west, and the renewed autonomy of the former Ulus of Orda in the east, under the local Jochid khan Qara-Noqai. A greater threat proved to be the advance of another Jochid prince, Ordu Malik, on the capital Sarai in 1361. In circumstances that remain obscure, Khiḍr Khan and his son Qutlugh were now murdered by another son of Khiḍr Khan, Timur Khwaja, who seized the throne at Sarai, in August 1361.[2] Timur Khwaja would reign for only a short time, possibly five weeks.[3] Nevertheless, coins were minted in his name at Sarai and Mokhshi; the latter might have been Timur Khwaja's original base.[4] He was opposed from the start by his uncle, Murād (or Murīd), who declared himself khan at Gülistan, by the advancing Ordu Malik, and possibly by Mamai in the west. In these circumstances, Timur Khwaja quickly lost control of Sarai and fled back east of the Volga before being killed. Unsurprisingly, he had accomplished little. He was succeeded at Sarai by the triumphant Ordu Malik.[5] The murder of Khiḍr Khan by Timur Khwaja and the latter's brief and unsuccessful reign contributed to the deepening of the Golden Horde's political crisis, from which it would never completely recover.

The brevity and confusion of Timur Khwaja's reign are reflected in the minimal information preserved in the sources, as well as a great deal of variation as to the details. The above summary represents the most generally accepted version of the events, although there exist slightly different interpretations.[6] The sources exhibit disagreements even over the name of Khiḍr Khan's parricide son, some of them apparently confusing him with Khiḍr Khan's brother Murād (or Murīd).[7] The very unreliable but formerly historiographically influential Muʿīn-ad-Dīn Naṭanzī (earlier known as the "Anonymous of Iskandar") gives Timur Khoja impossibly as the son of Ordu Shaykh (i.e., Ordu Malik) and as the brother of Murīd, and gives the future khan ʿAzīz Shaykh as son of Timur Khwaja. Naṭanzī also attributes a reign of some two years to Timur Khwaja, and has him murdered, unrecognized, by the husband of a woman he assaulted.[8] Given Naṭanzī's obvious errors, it is difficult to know how much of the remaining information he relates may be reliable. Even the Russian chronicles disagree as to whether it was the forces of Mamai or those of Ordu Malik that terminated Timur Khwaja's reign; moreover, the length of this brief reign also varies among different sources, from about a week to two weeks, to five weeks, ignoring Naṭanzī's impossible two years.[9]

Genealogy

See also

References

  1. ↑ Tizengauzen 2006: 431-432; Počekaev 2010: 147-148; May 2018: 302; Howorth 1880: 196 had already inferred that Khiḍr Khan was most likely a descendant of Shiban.
  2. ↑ Grigoriev 1983: 29, 54.
  3. ↑ Vernadsky 1953: 246.
  4. ↑ Safargaliev 1960: 114-115; Grigoriev 1983: 29-30.
  5. ↑ Howorth 1880: 196-198; Nasonov 1940: 119, n. 1; Safargaliev 1960: 114-115, 117; Grekov & Jakubovskij 1950: 273-275; Grigoriev 1983: 29; Gaev 2002: 18-19; Počekaev 2010: 124-125, 148-150.
  6. ↑ For example, Počekaev 2010: 308, n. 322 reasons that Khiḍr Khan must have been killed by his rival Orda Malik rather than by his own son, as explicitly stated in the sources.
  7. ↑ This confusion is found in the Čingīz-Nāmah - Burut (Judin 1992: 113); Khwandamir - Murdād (Thackston 1994: 43); the Troitskaja chronicle - Murut (Howorth 1880: 197).
  8. ↑ Tizengauzen 2006: 257.
  9. ↑ Safargaliev 1960: 114-115; Počekaev 2010: 308, n. 324.
  • Gaev, A. G., "Genealogija i hronologija Džučidov," Numizmatičeskij sbornik 3 (2002) 9-55.
  • Grekov, B. D., and A. J. Jakubovskij, Zolotaja orda i eë padenie. Moscow, 1950.
  • Grigoriev, A. P., "Zolotoordynskie hany 60-70-h godov XIV v.: hronologija pravlenii," Istriografija i istočnikovedenie stran Azii i Afriki 7 (1983) 9-54.
  • Howorth, H. H., History of the Mongols from the 9th to the 19th Century. Part II.1. London, 1880.
  • Judin, V. P., Utemiš-hadži, Čingiz-name, Alma-Ata, 1992.
  • May, T., The Mongol Empire. Edinburgh, 2018.
  • Nasonov, A. N., Mongoly i Rus', Moscow, 1940.
  • Počekaev, R. J., Cari ordynskie: Biografii hanov i pravitelej Zolotoj Ordy. Saint Petersburg, 2010.
  • Safargaliev, M. G., Raspad Zolotoj Ordy. Saransk, 1960.
  • Thackston, W. M. (trans.), Khwandamir, Habibu's-siyar. Tome Three. Cambridge, MA, 1994.
  • Tizengauzen, V. G. (trans.), Sbornik materialov otnosjaščihsja k istorii Zolotoj Ordy. Izvlečenija iz persidskih sočinenii, republished as Istorija Kazahstana v persidskih istočnikah. 4. Almaty, 2006.
  • Vernadsky, G., The Mongols and Russia, New Haven, 1953.
  • Vohidov, Š. H. (trans.), Istorija Kazahstana v persidskih istočnikah. 3. Muʿizz al-ansāb. Almaty, 2006.
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