Genghis Khan: A History of China

The Mongolian steppe is running out of room for rival rulers.

In Genghis Khan: A History of China - Part Two, Temüjins growing power brings him into an increasingly dangerous struggle with Toro, the Kerait leader who had once been his patron and foster-father figure. Around them stand Senggum, Jamukha, the Naiman, and a shifting world of sworn brotherhood, marriage alliances, tribal loyalty, ambition, and betrayal.

From the contest for supremacy on the Mongolian Plateau, the story expands into the creation of the Great Mongol State under Genghis Khan and the campaigns that carried Mongol power far beyond the steppe. The narrative follows confrontations with the Naiman, Western Xia, the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty, the Western Liao, and the Khwarezmian Empire, moving through Zhongdu, Central Asia, Otrar, and the wider Eurasian world.

Along the way appear commanders and advisers including Muqali, Boorchu, Jebe, Subutai, Yelü Chucai, and the Daoist master Qiu Chuji, as military conquest increasingly raises questions of government, religion, trade, diplomacy, and succession.

Written as accessible narrative history, this volume explains complicated alliances and campaigns through the people making the decisions-often under pressure, sometimes brilliantly, and sometimes disastrously.

It is the story of how Temüjins struggle for survival became something far larger: the making of Genghis Khan and an empire that could no longer be contained by the steppe.