Tolui

Life and work

As a young child, Tolui was the subject of a kidnapping attempt by Tatars shortly after his father's campaign against them.^[3] Tolui and Sorghaghtani had four sons: Möngke (born 1209), Kublai (born 1215), Hulagu (born 1217), and Ariq Böke.^[3] He captured the city of Merv after assessing its fortifications for six days.^[4] According to Juvayni, the city was razed in revenge, with only 400 craftsmen spared from the massacre.^[5]

Tolui died later in 1232, and the official account in the Secret History records that he sacrificed his life in a shamanic ritual to spare his brother Ögedei.^[2] There is no consensus on Tolui's birth year: Christopher Atwood argues for 1191 or 1192, whereas Frederick W. Mote and Paul Ratchnevsky favor a date in the late 1180s.^[6] During the invasion of the Khwarazmian realm, Tolui led a force estimated by Carl Sverdrup at roughly 7,000 soldiers in the Khorasan campaign.^[4]

What the cited sources add

The early 20th-century historian Vasily Bartold, citing a local history from the 1400s, stated that none of the inhabitants of Herat were killed except the garrison.^[4] A chronicle found in 1944 showed that Herat experienced two separate sieges.^[4] Michal Biran has proposed that the rapid introduction of East Asia's pragmatic, brutal warfare into the less ruthless Muslim world contributed to cultural shock.^[7] Atwood suggests that the straightforward explanation of death from alcoholism, reported by Juvayni, is the most probable cause.^[8]