Marco Polo - Laurence Bergreen [51]
At times, the Secret History unfolds as if it were a saga of the American West, with its tales of horse rustling, sharp bargaining, and sudden displays of cunning and heroism, all set in the midst of a primeval landscape. But every incident and topic, from horses to hawking, struck a chord in the Mongol psyche, as the Secret History preserved the lifestyle embodied and codified by the warrior Genghis Khan.
As this collection of tales makes plain, ceaseless conflict shaped Mongol life—at first among siblings, and later among tribes—until Genghis Khan beat his rivals into submission and unified the realm. The Secret History tells of a symbolic battle among Temüjin, as the young Genghis Khan was known, and his half brothers over a “small fish,” a mere minnow. Their “noble mother” ordered, “Desist. Why do you, older and younger brothers, behave in such a way toward one another?…Why do you not work together? You must cease to behave in such a way.”
Temüjin and Qasar, his brother and ally, complained, “Only yesterday we shot down a lark with a horn-tipped arrow and they snatched it away from us. Now they have done the same again. How can we live together?” With that, the boys stomped out of the ger, mounted their horses, and went to avenge the theft, shooting arrows at the brothers who had tormented them. But when they returned, they confronted something far worse: their enraged mother. “You destroyers!” she cried, comparing them to wild animals:
Like the qasar [wild] dog gnawing on its own afterbirth,
like a panther attacking on a rocking mountain,
like a lion unable to control its anger,…
like a gerfalcon attacking its own shadow,…
like a male camel biting the heel of its young,…
thus you have destroyed!
Apart from our shadows, we have no friends.
Apart from our tails, we have no fat.
This last line referred both to the fat-tailed sheep on which they lived, and, by extension, to their kin. Thanks to the harsh discipline administered by his formidable mother, Temüjin eventually learned the lesson of cooperation and emerged as Genghis Khan, who transcended the internecine quarrels that marked Mongol history, and the Mongol psyche, to bring about a heavily guarded peace and stability.
THE MONGOLS believed that Genghis had come to them from the sky, and that after his death he returned to his home in the firmament. But his earthly dynasty continued after him. His grandson Kublai was born in relative obscurity, a circumstance that may have kept him out of harm’s way, and he advanced not because he was the chosen successor to Genghis but because he was cunning and resourceful enough to maneuver his way to the pinnacle of the Mongol hierarchy. No rival posed a greater threat to Kublai than a young khan called Kaidu. Although the two were cousins, Kaidu “never had peace with the Great Khan,” Marco says, and that is an understatement. The reason was simple enough: “Kaidu always demanded of the Great Khan that he wished his share of the conquest they have made.” Kublai replied that he would agree, if Kaidu promised to “go to his court and to his council every time that he should send to see him.” Kaidu refused “because he was afraid that he [Kublai] would have him killed.”
Matters came to a head in 1266, when Kaidu attacked two of Kublai’s barons, Kibai and Kaban, who had converted to Christianity. The opponents fought a tremendous contest involving 200,000 horsemen, with Kaidu emerging as the victor. “He grew in bombast and pride thereby,” Marco says.