Tamerlane and the Battle of Ankara

Timur the Lame (that's Tamerlane to the Westerners) conquered areas from Persia to Russia throughout the late 1300s. His last great battle was in Ankara against Sultan Bayezid I. But how exactly did he gain the upper hand? Tune in to find out.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how
Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm to blame a chuk rewarding and I'm scared Dolly,
and we've we've really enjoyed the topics that we've been
covering lately, but there's one thing that's been missing, and

(00:21):
we've really been missing it, and that is a proper exhamation.
And that's why I really perked up when listener Will
suggested a podcast on tamer Lane, which offers us not
only an exhimation and a curse, but, as he describes it,
a person who is a patron of the arts, a
military genius, and a bloodthirsty conqueror all wrapped up in

(00:42):
one sounds right up our alley. It does, and it
was funny because when Will suggested this, he mentioned that
he found it because he had just moved to a
new city and he didn't know anybody, so he was
researching bloody conquests. That's something a little ominous. Will it does.
I can't say, well that that's going to make you
a lot of friends, but it definitely gets us on
your side. But back to tamer Lane. He's also known

(01:05):
as Tiamore, and he wasn't your average ruthless warrior. He
conquered an empire that stretched from the Aegean to the Ganges,
and he's been called the last great nomad, predator, one
of history's most notorious psychopaths, and the scourge of God.
He's even claimed ascent from Genghis Khan, which is gonna
make sense when we look at his life a little later.

(01:26):
So with that kind of street cred, it's clear that
there are a lot of stories that we could tell
about this guy. But to keep things simple, we're going
to focus on his last major battle, which was the
Battle of Ankara, in which he went up against another
great force, the Ottoman Empire, and you really get to
see the tactics that made him who he was when

(01:48):
when you look at this battle closely, and the battle
itself is is pretty famous. It makes an appearance in
our old friend Christopher Marlowe's play Timberland the Great, and
even though in that case, you know it's been dramatized,
the events surrounding our protagonist in this player fictionalized. So
we're going to start with some something with some real
historical truth to it. The early days of tumor's life. Yes,

(02:12):
he was born with the name Timore, which means iron
in Turkic, on April eight, thirteen thirty six in Kesh,
which is south of Summer Kand and what is now Uzbekistan,
and his father was a minor chief of the bar
Lass tribe and settled in that area at the heart
of the crumbling Mongol Empire, which was breaking apart into

(02:32):
warring factions ruled by descendants of Genghis Khan. And these
were the three factions, the Choga Tai Khanate, the ill
Knnied Dynasty, and the so called Golden Horde. So the
Barlass were part of the Chagatai Khanate, which had its
own trouble with tensions between nomadic tribes and those who
wanted to settle life. So there was a lot of

(02:53):
tribal in fighting, yeah, as well as these grander model
in fighting tensions. So a lot going on. But Timur
came up in this environment and started out as kind
of a bandit really, probably participating in these intertribal disputes,
but also doing just some plain old criminal stuff. It
was during a raid while he was still a young man.

(03:15):
Some say he was stealing sheep. That he was injured
in his right arm and leg, and his right arm
was just left completely useless, and because of the injuries
in his right leg, he walked with a limp. So
this is what actually led to that western name. Tamberline
was originally timor e length or two more the lame,

(03:36):
which was obviously not a flattering title. It was something
used by his enemies to to mock him. Yeah, but
even after those injuries, it's interesting, he was still a
force to be reckoned with. He was a big, strong
guy with a large head and a long beard of
a reddish hue, or that's what said of him anyway.
And he became a skilled horseman and a superior soldier,

(03:58):
and he quickly built up a following. And then in
thirteen sixty one, Teamour took charge of the area around
Summer kand when he swore allegiance to took look who
had taken over the Chagatai Khanate. And when took Luk
died not long after, Teamore actually formed an alliance with
another tribal chief named Hussain, and they split up the
areas and kind of put down the other warring tribes

(04:20):
and took over ruling this area. Yeah, but eventually Timore
even turned on Hussein and defeated him. So working his
way up all the while, and by thirteen seventy he
was just in his early thirties. He was at that
point the ruler of the Chekatai Khanate, which had its
capital at Summer Kan. So he had gone from just

(04:41):
being the son of one of these local tribes to
ruling the whole khan Yeah. And this is the point
that also he starts claiming to be a descendant of
Genghis Khan. The more most sources indicate that this is
probably unlikely. And he's announcing his goal of re establishing
the Mongol Empire. So he's establishing the strategy of war

(05:04):
abroad and peace or a more subtled life at home,
which satisfies kind of everyone. It satisfies those who want
new conquests as well as those who wanted the more stable,
settled life. He re establishes and monopolizes the Silk Road
and spends the thirteen eighties and nineties invading and conquering
many areas, including Persia, Iraq, Armenia, Georgia, Anatolia, Syria, all

(05:27):
of Central Asia, Northern India, and the approaches to China
and much of southern Russia too. Probably his longest struggle though,
was that against the Golden Horde, one of those original
warring factions that we talked about, and he finally defeated
them in thirteen. So we've got to talk about how
he did all of this. I mean, that's a pretty
impressive list. You just strattled off there to Lena. First

(05:51):
of all, he was really scary. I mean, that was
his prime way of conquering all of these territories. He
served up his invasions with a keeping helping of violence.
You could say he would basically come in, destroy entire cities,
massacre their entire populations, and then build towers or pyramids
out of their severed heads. Seriously, Yeah, that was kind

(06:13):
of his trademark. It was in Isfahan in Central Asia,
for example, he demanded that each of his soldiers take
a severed head, and it amounted to seventy thousand total
that were built into towers, and another city, two thousand
people were cemented together to make a living tower. So,
I mean, you hear numbers like this all the time.
Seventy thousand, ninety twenty thousand. These are the numbers that

(06:37):
were involved in these massacres, and uh, it's sort of amazing, well,
and it makes you reconsider what he was actually out
there doing to Richard Cavendish in History Today called these
quote more in the nature of large scale looting expeditions
than empire building, and it it does seem that way.
And it's really no wonder that people were so afraid
of him, because he used fear as a compelling weapon

(07:00):
and as much as any of his other tactics, which
also included things like lightning advances and feigned retreats and ambushes.
So he was smart in a military sense, but it
was the spear tactic that really accomplished things in the end.
He would even send secret agents ahead of troops to
spread rumors about atrocity, so cities would get scared and

(07:21):
sort of lay down their arms. Not that that would
really help them very much in the end. No, it
didn't done a lot of cases. But Teymour was also
somewhat contradictory and that he wasn't just a killing machine.
He was also a fine chess player. He actually created
the game of tamer Lane chess, and he enjoyed a
good theological discussion now and again he engaged scholars in debate.

(07:42):
He also did a lot to beautify his capital summercand
He encouraged art, their literature, science, and public works. And
it seems like the one group of people that he
consistently spared when he did loot these towns where the
cities artisans, they're fine crafts, and he would bring them
back to to his capital and have them beautify it

(08:05):
and build new buildings and and just make it a
better place. That's kind of ironic, though, when you consider
that Timour himself spent very little time in his capital. No,
he usually only stayed there for a few days at
a time. He was truly a nomad. He personally led
all of his campaigns and he was constantly campaigning. He
was in Summer con for about two years at the

(08:27):
end of the thirteen nineties, but then invaded India in
thirt officially because the Sultan of Delhi wasn't persecuting the
Hindus enough, but it kind of just seemed like an
excuse of the house exactly, and he ended up destroying
Deli and he killed a hundred thousand civilians and according
to most sources, this took more than a century for

(08:47):
the city to recover from. So even after that bloody
Indian campaign, he still had a couple empires left to
polish off. One was the mom Luke Empire in Syria
in Egypt, and he sacked Damascus in fourteen oh one.
Classic fear tactics kind of stuff went on there, and
then the only place left standing was the Ottoman Empire

(09:10):
in Turkey, which at the time was led by Sultan
by a z the First and by a Ze who
was also known as the Thunderbolt. Wasn't really a guy
to be messed with. I mean, if anybody was going
to go up against Tamerlane, it seems like the Sultan
would be the guy to do it. Definitely. He was
also a proven general. He had defeated the Serbs at

(09:31):
Kosovo intight nine and then killed his own brother to
solidify his position at the head of the empire, so
absolutely seems like someone who could go toe to toe
with Teamore. And that Kosovo victory had also launched a
European crusade against him, which by a Ze'd also put down.
So like Teamore, he had a very disciplined army though
many of them were Christian drawn from conquered lands in Europe.

(09:54):
The most famous part of this army of his, though,
was probably his elite Janissary infantry. They were taken from
their families at an early age and educated in war
and in Islam, and their single mission in life would
be to fight for their faith. They had a cavalry
to and a more significant infantry even than Teamore had,
so a lot to go up against, so it was

(10:14):
clear that defeating by a Zeed wasn't going to be simple.
But Teamwoar couldn't ignore him either. By a Zeed had
antagonized him by giving refuge to Teamor's enemies and attacking
areas that were under his control, he had to be
put down, essentially, and negotiations had been going on between
the two men for some time, but by this point
the situation had devolved into essentially an exchange of insults.

(10:37):
War had to had to finally follow that. So Teamor's
forces invaded the Ottoman domain in the spring of fourteen
o two, and they felt pretty ready because they had
already laid waste to all of the regions surrounding the empire,
so they didn't have to worry about anybody immediately rushing
into the aid of by A Zeed. And to add

(10:58):
to that, Teamor's army had also called up some fresh
reserves from samarcand so they were really ready to go
out and and fight the janissaries and and fight by
Zed's army. Yeah, they started out by trying to use
that fear thing with the last Ottoman delegation that had
come to negotiate with them. They kind of showed off
their reserves, you know, showed off their elephants and everything

(11:19):
that they had with them, and and it kind of worked.
By a Zeed's army, they were probably pretty impressed by this.
But by A Zed at the time had his forces
concentrated in a Kara, which was a city that commanded
the approaches to Constantinople and the Ottoman capital of Brusa.
So at this point he's really at a crossroads. He
has a decision to make do I stay here or

(11:40):
do I go out and meet Teamore's army head on,
And he decides to march eastward toward Teamore, acting on
the information that Teamurs forces are marching northwest took Cot
so he thinks he knows where he's going and he
thinks he has the advantage over Teamore at this point.
But that's not Teamor's plan after all. Maybe it was
because that proposed approach was too mountainous. Maybe because Teamore

(12:03):
knew that by Zid expected him to go northwest. Teamore
instead moved southwest and made this loop north and then
further west again, all the way back around to Ankara,
where he laid siege to the city and Teamore actually
suits up for this. He's sixty six years old, but
he's not about to miss any campaign after this long

(12:26):
military career. Yeah, by a Zide had figured out the
location of Teamours forces through a couple of skirmishes and
rushes back to Ankara. And here's where by Zeine misses
a really key opportunity. Instead of catching Team More off
guard and attacking immediately, he chooses to give battle the
following day to give his forces a chance to rest.

(12:47):
Seems to make sense, right, but this takes away the
surprise advantage and also gives them plenty of time to
dehydrate in the heat of July because Teamore has actually
diverted the only available water supply. He's been really busy.
He has while waiting for Bayazeeds Army Team Wars forces
had built a diversion dam upstreet on Kubook Creek with

(13:08):
a breach in it that would let the creek continue
flowing downstream until they decided to close it. So see
it looked like yeah, exactly. Then they made a reservoir
on a western tributary downstream and a canal was dug
from the diversion dam to the reservoir to funnel off
the streams remaining water when the dam was sealed off.

(13:29):
And this was made possible. I mean, it may seem
just completely unbelievable, but it was possible because of the
thousands of men that were available and by Team Wars
trained elephants, which were trophies of his victory in India
that he'd brought along with him. So when by Zede arrived,
he saw the Kobuk Creek flowing, but downstream it was
actually dry and there was no other source of water

(13:50):
available to the Ottoman Army. Thousands of soldiers and horses
were involved here, so you definitely needed water to keep going. Exactly.
So this day of resting up turns out to be
a day of trying out in the July heat and
giving teamore the advantage to knowing that you're there. The
actual battle finally took place on July two, and according

(14:12):
to an article by Simon Craig and Military History, one
of our favorite sources for battle information, there were between
two hundred thousand and four hundred thousand troops on the
field altogether, and the numerical advantage probably was with Teamore.
So Teamor organized his forces into eight different detachments, and
he himself controlled the center detachment. One of his sons

(14:36):
commanded the left wing, and another son commanded the right wing,
and that really fresh reserve from back home was placed
at the rear between the main body of the army
and the still defiant city of Ankara. So try to
imagine all of that set up, and then imagine those
elephants fresh from all of these canal projects apparent really

(15:01):
they are wearing armor of painted leather, and the men
on top of the elephants who are who are all
in front, by the way, had flame throwers, and the
elephants themselves had these curved blades attached to their tusks.
And we're trained actually advance with a plunging motion to
just create as much havoc as possible, as if an

(15:22):
elephant charging towards you wasn't scary enough. Yeah, exactly. I
mean it's assumed that these were mostly there for intimidation
or mostly there for show, but I mean a bladed elephants,
it counds really scary. Yeah, they could really do some damage.
So the Ottoman four set up across for them on
some low hills near Mountain Era and by a Ze
commanded the center, with the Army of Romelia supported by

(15:44):
tatars to his left and that of Anatolia backed up
by Serbs to his right, and the first clash was
between the Ottoman left and Teamar's right. The Ottomans were
repulsed at this point, um so teamore side was winning
on that end. But then Teamore launched his left wing
against the Serbs on the Ottoman right, and that didn't
go so well for Team Or. His forces were driven

(16:05):
back at first, and it really seemed like the Ottoman
forces had the advantage at that point, But then there
was a twist by ZEDs touch our forces on the
left turn against him and joined up with Teamor. And
most people think that Teamwors agents had been there for
a little bit. Another another problem about waiting for a day,
Teamors agents that had time to sneak in, start talking

(16:28):
to people and and turn some turn some opinions. Regardless, though,
this allowed Teamor to focus on buy zds center as
by Zes left just completely crumbled, so some of the
soldiers on buy Z's right ended up switching teams as well,
and by that point it was pretty much decided. With
so much betrayal on the Ottoman Forces side, um, it

(16:52):
was clearly Teamor's battle. Yeah, and just a note about
the role of betrayal here, because obviously played a really
big role. In his article, Craig says that the root
of this treachery was probably low morale among bias Eds
troops as cold hearted as Teamore seemed. In fact, he
placed a big importance on the morale of his troops,
so for example, if they need a little boost in morale,

(17:16):
he would bring in some astrologers who would predict a
victorious outcome a lot of heads in their future. But yeah, exactly,
and I mean, come to think of it, that's what happened, right, So,
I mean it seemed to work for them, but BIASEDS
troops weren't so lucky. By Ze tried to hold his
ground for a while, but he eventually tried to flee
and was captured himself. He was transported to summercond after

(17:39):
that and imprisoned, where he died a year later. Some
say from despair, although I'm not sure how much I
really buy into that being Team as prisoner. I mean,
I imagine that would be difficult. It's kind of amazing
that he was even kept as the prisoner in the
first place. Yeah, I don't know what the reasoning behind
that was. He would think that someone is ruthless as
Teamore would just sort of have him killed off right away,

(18:01):
But not so and tamer Lane at this point, now
approaching seventy, he's not taking a break, even though he's
finally defeated his biggest foe at the time. He is,
at that point seventy years old, planning his next campaign
in China. But he died on route to China February
oh five, luckily for people where he was headed. So

(18:24):
after Teamoor's death, his empire pretty much became engulfed in
civil war and disintegrated. Teamoor himself never really bothered with administration,
so there was no social, economic, or political cohesion, just
this fear of team Or. Apparently, and as Craig puts it,
the battle with sort of the end in itself for Teamor,
and He's quote perhaps best understood as a sort of

(18:47):
career criminal, a gangster on the grand scale. And yeah,
it makes sense that without that compelling figure behind it all,
the empire is not gonna last. But even though his
empire didn't last, Teamore himself is still revered and was
after that. He was buried in a sarcophagus covered by
a huge slab of jade and a mausoleum known as

(19:07):
Guri Amir. I think that's the closest I can get
to a good pronunciation of that. If anyone has any
better corrections, please let me know, or if you visited,
if you've visited, because apparently it's still called one of
the greatest treasures of Islamic architecture, and that mausoleum is
still shrouded in mystery. Legend has it that the disturber
of his tomb would be cursed, and no one really

(19:29):
tempted fate there, no one really tried to disturb his
tomb for more than five hundred years until in June
the Soviet Archaeological Commission opened the tomb and examined the
skeleton within, and the remains included hairs, including a few
bristles of chestnut mustache, and fragments of skin and muscle tissue,
and the measurements of the skeleton revealed that at around

(19:52):
a hundred seventy centimeters, Team War was actually tall for
the time and very powerful, and the injuries on his
right side were confirmed. Then he was in fact lame
because his right leg was shorter than his left, and
his whole frame was kind of twisted. And one scientist
involved actually used the skull to make a facial reconstruction,
so we can see what his features look like. What

(20:13):
about the curse? What about the curse? That's a good question. Well,
some say it came true. It was Soviet scientists involved,
and days after the tomb was opened, Hitler attacked Soviet Russia. Yeah,
that's a pretty serious curse. That is a pretty serious curse.
But he was a pretty scary guy Team War was.
So I think that it's only appropriate now that we

(20:35):
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