Sunday, February 18, 2007
This Day in Central Asian History
On this day in 1405, Tīmūr bin Taraghay Barlas (who has many AKAs including Tamerlane (Timur the Lame)) dies of fever on an expedition against Ming dynasty China. Descendant of Ghengis Khan but born in Uzbekistan and speaking a Turkish language, Timur created an empire from the Persian Gulf to the Volga and Irtish and from the Hellespont to the Ganges, which lasted in some form until 1837. He is well respected in the central Asia countries but reviled by the Arabs, so he probably was a good guy. Another hole in my history education.
# posted by Roger Fraley @ 8:06 AM 
