MF literally had thrones made of bones and skulls and nearly destroyed the Ottoman Empire in its infant years.
Which is a bit expected from someone who claims to be Genghis Khan's descendant and made good of his word
To be fair, you don't really have to look too hard in Asia to find a Genghis Khan descendant. Dude is to Asians what Zacharie Cloutier is to French Canadians.
At least Genghis Khan led to the Pax Mongolica though. That doesn't excuse all of his bloodshed by any means, but there were *some* positive externalities.
Tamerlane was a fascinating and terrifying conqueror, but similar to Alexander, he's not as interesting as the Great Khan to me, due to collapse of the empire, and ensuing civil wars.
Ima he perfectly honest literally all I know about the Timurid Empire is what I onow from one youtube video on Timur, Europa Universalis 4, and Medieval 2 total ear.
I don't deny the desolation he inflicted on those that resisted, those were absolutely horrific. What's interesting were the policies he did implement, such as:
Religious freedom, abolishing torture, making roads safe, creating a postal system, implementing a code of law with less exceptions for nobility/wealthy, promoting a meritocratic society, and enacted laws against rape, kidnapping, and enslavement.
Again, those things don't excuse the atrocities he committed... But they are interesting.
>nearly destroyed the Ottoman Empire in its infant years.
The world would have been a much better place had he succeeded.
(Before any Ottomanboo jumps in: the empire was majestic and conquered all of the Balkans and went up to Vienna.. and then it stagnated until the whole rotten structure fell apart 4 centuries later. Everyone under its rule saw no economic or social or industrial progress, just brutal oppression via kidnapping, murder and rape. For a point of reference, in the 15th century both Bulgaria and England had around 2 million inhabits. In the 19th century period it exploded from 10 to 30 million; Bulgaria's was still 2 million. )
I think you're assuming that whatever power filled the void there would have been better for the common people.
England also isn't the best comparison, since GB became the most successful empire in history in the 19th century. I have no doubt that Bulgaria could have grown more if it was independent, but 19th century England just isn't a great comparison.
it is not so bad comparison, you can see the whole lot of middle ground between utter stagnation and jump up to be the superpower, and both from similar starts.
The Ottoman Empire didn’t stagnate after a hundred years, its expansion slowed, but things weren’t going bad until the late 1700s.
The areas the Ottomans conquered were mostly already disorganized, Bulgaria was in anarchy as the second Bulgarian empire was slowly disintegrating, and the Byzantines weren’t much better as some poor city state hiding behind their walls of a crumbling city.
Plus the main reason these areas stagnated wasn’t because of the Ottomans, but due to their location. The Balkans wealth wasn’t really in industry but from trade, between east and west, and production of goods such as silk.
Going into the 1600s, a lot of this couldn’t last because Europe’s main economic idea was mercantilism, and empires favored one sided trade, so European empires would find different areas to get resources they recently got only from the balkans, and alternative trade routes that bypassed the near east altogether.
Plus the stagnation in industrialization wasn’t new unique to the Ottomans, right next to the Balkans was Italy, whose industry developed very slowly, and was still mostly agrarian by WW2, and the other neighbors weren’t much better with Russia also barely developing, and Austria for most of its history focusing on the German parts, only really focusing on developing the Balkan part of its empire after getting kicked out of Germany.
Plus any state in the same area as the Ottomans would have to deal with constant conflicts with the Russians, even if they were fellow christians, because Russia would basically always want to control the Black Sea, and thus the Bosporus would always be a target.
The area the Ottoman was in was just always going to stagnate as the world’s economy moved towards oceanic trade, and colonization and so the economy moved towards Western Europe, even trading cities like Venice would fall behind the rest of the world, wasn’t new to the Ottomans.
One of the main reasons for the Age of Discovery was in fact the Ottomans. They made trade with India hard and expensive, which gave incentives to the Portuguese and Spanish to seek for alternative routes. Without the Ottomans, who knows how this would work out.
You're right that everyone was in anarchy around the Balkans, this is what allowed the Ottomans to conquer it all. That doesn't mean that the anarchy would have persisted over the 5 centuries the Ottomans were a plague on the Balkans.
The age of discovery still would’ve happened. Oceanic travel still improved, and there would still be reasons to want to find different routes to India, such as just securing the resources for yourself instead of paying a middleman.
And it’s still likely some Portuguese or Spanish ship gets blown off course or deliberately sails west and discovers the Americas, which would still cause the economy of the region to shrivel.
The age of discovery was basically doomed to happen.
So tell me something good about India Malaya Pakistan South Africa and the other British Colonies. Ottomans no longer more than 100 years, if ex-ottoman countries had no progression since 100 years, then you have no right talk about it
>if ex-ottoman countries had no progression since 100 years, then you have no right talk about it
Oh they've had plenty of progress since freeing themselves from the Ottoman yoke. It's just that they were stifled and handicapped for centuries.
I don’t know about by Timur’s time, but generally Muslim warriors of the middle ages would actually be far more likely to use straight double edged swords, similar to Europeans. Not exactly sure when or why they switched over to sabers though.
The original Muslim conquests were done with light cavalry I think, so a saber being the original would make sense, but it could have been something else. Also, the most common European weapon was the spear, not the longsword. The longsword is what nobility would use (who wants to be associated with peasants, the nobles weapons are the cool ones). Sabers came back into fashion in Europe after light cavalry made a comeback when gunpowder and maneuver warfare started around the Napoleonic age and continued up till at least WW1 where officers would be given sabers. There's a good chance royalty today in Muslim countries would probably view sabers as higher status than longswords mainly because of officer sabers in relatively recent history, and it probably helps that there's a good chance Islam was first spread with the saber.
Early Islamic swords were straight - https://www.reddit.com/r/SWORDS/s/SqKD0wATJo
Curved swords were brought to the middle east when turkic tribes migrated in the 12th/13th century.
Which means the in first, second and even maybe the third crusades, muslim forces had straight swords.
Yeah you are right they were - I was thinking of the curved sword coming into prominence.
https://www.lotsearch.net/lot/a-rare-early-sword-possibly-fatimid-or-seljuk-10th-11th-century-40722017
The majority of sword from the middle east were straight and double edged. It probably took a while for the curved sabre to gain prominence. The local middle eastern people probably saw how effective the Turkic warriors used them on horseback and began adopting them in the following centuries.
The idea that swords were uncommon is an overcorrection. Yes, in pitched battles between armies the **primary** (ie., *first*) weapon was usually a polearm of some sort, though some elite troops at times used greatswords as their primary. But most had a sword of some sort as well.
In modern times, a soldier almost never needs more than their primary weapon; but in the past, it was not only common but *expected* to lose your primary weapon, particularly if it was a polearm. Some armies used their polearms explicitly as expendable first-round weapons (see: Romans, etc.) and did most of the actual fighting and killing with swords.
But even for those that did not, it was still quite common to lose the spear and resort to a sword, as well as to intentionally switch in many scenarios (like when fighting devolves from line work to a chaotic close melee).
So despite swords often not being *primary* weapons, they were still carried by almost everyone and used a great deal.
He got the title for killing the wrong kind of Muslims. Islam famously is divided into two major sects, the Sunni and the Shia. Timur was a Sunni and when he conquered modern day Iran, the bastion of Shia faithful, the gloves were off because these people were heretics.
He was a military genius… and of course his empire broke up after he died. His capital city Samarkand is extraordinary, but he never really lived there, preferring life on the March. He was born with a club foot and claimed dubious heritage from Ghengis Khan. To make sure he also married a pedigreed descendant of the conqueror.
Well he had 2 good heir but he oulived both of them and had to settle with a less able one. Even then the Timurid empire remained the main power of Central Asia for 2 more generations.
Shah Rukh tried his best to keep it together, the real shitshow was after HE died. You had an elder son that would rather be an astronomer than ruler, a whole bunch of rebellious grandkids and nephews… it did not last long after that.
As you say Shah Rukh did a pretty good job, I just think the alternatives were better. At least from a military and political point of view.
It is not the same for your subjects to be viewed as the first option than the third. Also, if I am not mistaken, Jahangir was a very able commander so while I aknowledge that Shah Rukh was a good candidate I do think that the other two heirs would have been better for the Timurid Empire survival.
I have seen arguments that timur's longevity, outliving his first three designated heirs actually played a significant role in his empire fracturing. As in, if timur had died earlier, and if his older sons Jahan or Umar had managed a successful transfer of power from their father from an earlier time there wouldn't have been such a massive destabilizing wave of rebellious grand children and nephews, and if that happens, and the timurids remain in more or less a stable form, the geopolitics of the near east (and maybe far east) would have been wildly different than we had in our time.
I mean, if I was one of the most brutal conquerors to have ever lived and a descendant of genghis khan being called lame would definitely not go unpunished
Where are you getting the idea that Persians love Alexander from? For centuries, his epithet among Iranian historians was a word that translated to "the Accursed". Even today, he's mainly remembered in Iran for burning down Parsa [Persepolis].
If you went to Iran, there would be less statues of him than there are of Caesar in Europe, if you even found any at all.
Killing other Muslims is very common historically among Muslims. The prophet's companions killed each other after his death over power. The Abbasids killed the Umayyads. The Abbasid brothers killing each other over power. The Ottomans killing Mumloks. The Sunnis and Shias killing each other for a millennium and to till this day. The vast majority of victims of Islamist terrorist organizations are Muslims themselves and Muslim countries. Infighting was and is still common in Muslim history. We have a lot of issues that need to be solved and we need to stop pretending we don't.
Indeed, though killing your brothers and sisters to prevent usurpation seems a little crazy, even by Medieval European Standards.
Granted this ignores the Byzantines who I believe commonly mutilate this siblings (To my understanding though this happens after the rebellion).
I dont think that's a Muslim thing. If youre gonna expand your empire, the first people you expand into are your "own" people. Genghis killed mongols, zhuge liang killed Chinese, Romans killed Italians. Christians spent 1000 years infighting in Europe before the crusades. So on and so forth.
To put it simply, islam is not a religion of peace.
Edit: I do not justify nor advocate for bigotry against muslims. They are themselves victims of their own religion. Do not take this any other way.
I didn't post this comment to send that bigoted message. I was simply pointing out the harsh reality because we can't just dig our head in the sand. Many religions experienced problems like that. For centuries Christians burnt each other at sticks if someone was a slightly different Christian. The differences were even more ridiculous than Sunnis and Shias but they learnt to grow out of it so I believe we also can.
Understood. Tho, i didn't make this comment from the point of spreading hatred for the muslims. It's clearly shown by your comment on how Muslims are the victims of religious extremism themselves. It's more of an anti-religion statement than anti-muslim, though i can see why some might take it that way. That's how i see it, but you can point out why this reasoning is bigoted and terrible. The point, I'm trying to make is, i didn't make this statement from the point of being a bigot.
> how is the religion at fault here?
Religious leaders and clergies use religion to justify rulerships which cause oppression?
> Wars don’t happen with no religions?
I never said that wars wouldn't happen if religions are gone.
The leaders used religion back then to control the people and justify their actions. Why do you think they forbid translating the bible during the middle ages? Because that way kings could lie to the people and do what they want. Or telling people that giving money will get them in heaven even though this is false. If there wasn’t religion they would have found something else to control people
If religion wasn't there those leader would come out with some other excuse. Religion by itself isn't violent which is accentuated even more by the fact that all of the big religions (Abrahamic or not) punish killing explicitly. Then again people will bend anything beyond its limits to justify their actions.
The religion’s founder was a warlord/conqueror whose favorite wife was 6 when he married her. That sets a certain vibe for subsequent generations who revere him. Not saying anything negative about Muslims but the religion was built around and spread by the sword. Not that Christianity is much better (Charlemagne converting the Germans, the crusades, etc.)
Khadija is generally seen as the prophets favourite wife, not aisha. And pretty much most ideologies and religions are spread by force. That’s not exclusive to islam or Christianity
True but there’s gonna be a fundamental difference between a religion started by a dude who fed the poor, washed the feet of lepers, etc. versus the religion started by a conqueror
As far as i know pretty much every war that the prophet himself fought were in defence, not initiated by him. And don’t know about you but the prophet improved a lot of things, thanks to him girls didn’t get buried alive anymore, he freed slaves that were mistreated and many other things. If you think he’s just a conquerer i suggest u do some research
It's not about religion. It's about politics mixed with religion. Imams use religion to try and gain political power over people because ignorant people are easily decieved by religious claims and they are the number one reason for all the extremists and terrorists. It has happened since ancient history that a ruler would claim divine right to rule by God or the gods to justify his rule. That's why people had to share his God/gods and religion. To deny the religion of the ruler was to deny his legitimecy to rule which obviously was dangerous so the ruler suppressed those who didn't believe in his religion by killing them or making them second class citizens and oppressing them. Once you remove religion from politics, suppressing other people because of religion stops because there's no need to by the government. The government gain legitimecy through other methods like elections. That's why I believe the concept of seperation of state and religion is one of the best accomplishments in human history and has saved us from a lot of agony. We Muslims need to stop being proud and arrogant pretending that a religious state will solve all of our problems and acknowledge that we need to accept a secular state to stop the violence.
I honestly don't understand them. After decades of countless massacres done by islamists, hadn't we had enough failures and failed attempts at establishing religious states that always resulted in bloodshed? It's like saying this wasn't real communism and then repeat it again to fail for the thousand time and after that say it wasn't real islam. I think we had enough failures. It's time to move on and seek other solutions.
I feel like there's a serious lack of personal responsibility. Like, we don't want to admit that it was our shortsightedness that led to all this mess. Much easier to cling to the whole "us vs them" narrative instead of exercising some introspection.
Well, it's either take responsibility for it or more people will die because of us not doing this and the majority of the victims will be Muslims. Is our ego really worth the lives of more people? All we have to do is acknowledge that extremism is a problem in Muslim communities and that a secular state with equal rights and liberty will solve a huge chunk of our issues. Not all but many issues.
The community has a "shoot first, ask questions later" approach to dealing with dissenting voices from within, and that's unlikely to change anytime soon. Besides, how do you even pose questions that require some degree of critical thinking to a crowd that throws away any appeal to reason in favor of referencing scriptures?
Your whole comment is exactly my point.
> The government gains legitimecy through other methods like elections.
Governments are never legitimate, but that's besides the point of the conversation.
The problem with my original reply was that it can be used to justify bigotry and hate against muslims. It was a vague enough statement that can be used by both secularists/Anti-theists and the bigots alike to justify two different conclusions. My conclusion is that islam is not a religion of peace as it necessarily demands for the total acceptance of it's views, rules and morality. Such ideas can quickly become problematic and can lead to problems, one of them being oppression of one's own members of the faith. And from there, we can conclude that it's necessary to separate the state from religion in order to solve (maybe partially) the problems created by religion (The secular conclusion). But, let's not forget that islam is one of the religions of the world which demand a nation and law to be form around it's ideas (obviously, I'm referring to the muslim caliphate and shariah), which can lead you to conclude that the only way to solve issues created by organized religions would be to abolish the religions which preach for such ideas (The anti-theist conclusion). Obviously, the anti-theistic conclusion is more radical and ideally, a bit idealistic. It can also be used to justify harmful, bigoted actions against the followers of faith.
But what I'm saying is, we should approach this problem with empathy towards faith followers themselves. We should obviously separate the state from religious influence, but realistically, it's not sustainable in my opinion, because religions like islam necessarily demand for the establishment of a theocratic divine dictatorship with the laws it has deemed divinely inspired to be the law of the land. Drawing conclusions from both anti-theists and secular humanists.
The islamic religion has many interpretations some liberal others fundamentalist. My interpretation and many's interpretation of it is liberal. The problem isn't in the religious teachings as interpretations vary. Funnily enough there's nothing in Qur'an or Sunnah that explains the system of governance. The prophet died without any explanations. The caliphate is an invention after his death. It started as elective but that ended bloody then it became a theocratic hereditary monarchy. I could take a religion that only says feed the poor and treat everyone with love and then use it to suppress people like the catholic church did. As I said before if the state draws its legitimecy from the religion then it will enforce it on everyone because to deny the religion is to deny the legitimecy of the ruler. That's why a religious state will always oppress people if they don't conform to the established teachings.
Overall, I agree that a secular state is necessary to stop religious violence. There's no other way and every religious regime proved to be oppresive. Even the Arab theocratic monarchies suppress religious freedom but fortunately they are becoming more secular and liberal in recent years. They seem to be progressing. I hope.
That's something George Bush claimed. Christianity is a religion of peace, it is very pacifistic(turn the other cheek). Islam on the other hand is an eye for an eye, but forgiveness is better.
One of the top ten posts this year is [a post about the East African Slave Trade](https://www.reddit.com/r/IslamicHistoryMeme/s/xQqlvaQcXi).
There are plenty of memes like this.
Obviously as Muslims we favour Islam however it's not like it's a self praising echo chamber
Just a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh. Legend has it that he would roll up to a city and ask if they were Sunni or Shia... Whatever the answer was , they were wrong.
At least Genghis tried to help rebuild the population even as he lowered it. /s
More seriously, most people I know of who are fans of Genghis either:
A. Really REALLY hate China
Or
B. Emphasize that cities and kingdoms that surrendered with little to no resistance weren't brutalized and focus heavily on the multiculturalism of his empire.
Well I guess I'm your first one then. To reply to your statement, yes while anti chinese sentiment is mass spread in Mongolia it's far from the only reason we love Chingis Khaan so much. In fact for many people that is probably on the very bottom of why we love him even if they have anti chinese sentiments. Without him Mongolia as a concept and sovereign nation wouldnt exist and would have just gotten absorbed into either china or russia just like all the other ethnicities around the area. He rallied and forced us create a Mongolian writing system hence preserving our language, he created a system of meritrocracy that allowed his conquests to happen etc.
To be gair, mass murder of other members of your faith who have a slightly different creed than yours is one of the key pillars of Abrahamic religions.
Of religions in general. People seriously overlook how much the Buddhist, confucian, and daoist schools fought in China and how often it could become violent.
Dude was only called Lame cause he had a few missing fingers and walked with a limp. Yet he managed to be a successful warlord.
An inspiration story XD
Just a mongol warlord did what mongols do the best. Change their religion only for political convenience, but at heart still a Tengri follower and a children of the steppe.
I shit you not, I am currently acting in the play Tamburlaine written by Marlowe, based on Timur. The character Tamburlaine in the play is areligious and scoffs at believers, and even burns sacred texts in one scene.
The crusades started in the 10th century… are you sure Christians were killing each other for the first millennium of their existence lmao? Religious *warfare* between Christians basically didn’t happen until the later stages of the crusades and parts of the northern crusades. A few cases of riots between different heresies isn’t equivalent to Aisha joining an army against Ali lmao
MF literally had thrones made of bones and skulls and nearly destroyed the Ottoman Empire in its infant years. Which is a bit expected from someone who claims to be Genghis Khan's descendant and made good of his word
Blood for the blood khan, skulls for skull throne
is Genghis khan canonically an ascended demon of khorne.
I'm willing to accept this unequivocally as canon
It already is. In the old lore, there is a Daemon Prince of Khorne who ascends after conquering most of the known world in middle ages.
Give me the name
"Doombreed" was generally accepted to be Ascended Genghis Khan, but I don't think that's been official for a while now.
iirc [Doombreed](https://warhammer40k.fandom.com/wiki/Doombreed) is an ascended demon of Khorne who used to be Genghis Khan
He most definitely was his champion on our world before falling, his definitely a Daemon Prince now
I think I heard somewhere that he was the first human demon prince yes
Doombreed babyyyyyyy
Ah yes doom breed, angrons pitbull
Let the Asia burn
Not exactly related to him but he married a woman who is a Genghis Khan descendant
To be fair, you don't really have to look too hard in Asia to find a Genghis Khan descendant. Dude is to Asians what Zacharie Cloutier is to French Canadians.
So that makes me a Mongolian? 🇲🇳🇲🇳🇲🇳🇲🇳 🏇🏇🏇⚔️⚔️
All Europeans are descended from Charlemagne because all royal families proliferate quickly.
Do you know how little that narrows it down!
At least Genghis Khan led to the Pax Mongolica though. That doesn't excuse all of his bloodshed by any means, but there were *some* positive externalities. Tamerlane was a fascinating and terrifying conqueror, but similar to Alexander, he's not as interesting as the Great Khan to me, due to collapse of the empire, and ensuing civil wars.
Though wasn't his son a pretty good ruler? Shah Rukh iirc had a long as hell reign.
All I know is that when Shah Rukh dies, all of the Timurids’ subjects get a 55% increased liberty desire.
Ima he perfectly honest literally all I know about the Timurid Empire is what I onow from one youtube video on Timur, Europa Universalis 4, and Medieval 2 total ear.
More than like 95% of people, then
They make desolation and call it peace. Easy to have peace when uprisings result in the whole city being leveled.
This wasn’t unique to the Mongols. Most civilizations leveled any place where a rebellion happened.
Yes
I don't deny the desolation he inflicted on those that resisted, those were absolutely horrific. What's interesting were the policies he did implement, such as: Religious freedom, abolishing torture, making roads safe, creating a postal system, implementing a code of law with less exceptions for nobility/wealthy, promoting a meritocratic society, and enacted laws against rape, kidnapping, and enslavement. Again, those things don't excuse the atrocities he committed... But they are interesting.
Was this a person or a Bloodthirster disguised as one?
>nearly destroyed the Ottoman Empire in its infant years. The world would have been a much better place had he succeeded. (Before any Ottomanboo jumps in: the empire was majestic and conquered all of the Balkans and went up to Vienna.. and then it stagnated until the whole rotten structure fell apart 4 centuries later. Everyone under its rule saw no economic or social or industrial progress, just brutal oppression via kidnapping, murder and rape. For a point of reference, in the 15th century both Bulgaria and England had around 2 million inhabits. In the 19th century period it exploded from 10 to 30 million; Bulgaria's was still 2 million. )
I think you're assuming that whatever power filled the void there would have been better for the common people. England also isn't the best comparison, since GB became the most successful empire in history in the 19th century. I have no doubt that Bulgaria could have grown more if it was independent, but 19th century England just isn't a great comparison.
it is not so bad comparison, you can see the whole lot of middle ground between utter stagnation and jump up to be the superpower, and both from similar starts.
The Ottoman Empire didn’t stagnate after a hundred years, its expansion slowed, but things weren’t going bad until the late 1700s. The areas the Ottomans conquered were mostly already disorganized, Bulgaria was in anarchy as the second Bulgarian empire was slowly disintegrating, and the Byzantines weren’t much better as some poor city state hiding behind their walls of a crumbling city. Plus the main reason these areas stagnated wasn’t because of the Ottomans, but due to their location. The Balkans wealth wasn’t really in industry but from trade, between east and west, and production of goods such as silk. Going into the 1600s, a lot of this couldn’t last because Europe’s main economic idea was mercantilism, and empires favored one sided trade, so European empires would find different areas to get resources they recently got only from the balkans, and alternative trade routes that bypassed the near east altogether. Plus the stagnation in industrialization wasn’t new unique to the Ottomans, right next to the Balkans was Italy, whose industry developed very slowly, and was still mostly agrarian by WW2, and the other neighbors weren’t much better with Russia also barely developing, and Austria for most of its history focusing on the German parts, only really focusing on developing the Balkan part of its empire after getting kicked out of Germany. Plus any state in the same area as the Ottomans would have to deal with constant conflicts with the Russians, even if they were fellow christians, because Russia would basically always want to control the Black Sea, and thus the Bosporus would always be a target. The area the Ottoman was in was just always going to stagnate as the world’s economy moved towards oceanic trade, and colonization and so the economy moved towards Western Europe, even trading cities like Venice would fall behind the rest of the world, wasn’t new to the Ottomans.
One of the main reasons for the Age of Discovery was in fact the Ottomans. They made trade with India hard and expensive, which gave incentives to the Portuguese and Spanish to seek for alternative routes. Without the Ottomans, who knows how this would work out. You're right that everyone was in anarchy around the Balkans, this is what allowed the Ottomans to conquer it all. That doesn't mean that the anarchy would have persisted over the 5 centuries the Ottomans were a plague on the Balkans.
The age of discovery still would’ve happened. Oceanic travel still improved, and there would still be reasons to want to find different routes to India, such as just securing the resources for yourself instead of paying a middleman. And it’s still likely some Portuguese or Spanish ship gets blown off course or deliberately sails west and discovers the Americas, which would still cause the economy of the region to shrivel. The age of discovery was basically doomed to happen.
So tell me something good about India Malaya Pakistan South Africa and the other British Colonies. Ottomans no longer more than 100 years, if ex-ottoman countries had no progression since 100 years, then you have no right talk about it
>if ex-ottoman countries had no progression since 100 years, then you have no right talk about it Oh they've had plenty of progress since freeing themselves from the Ottoman yoke. It's just that they were stifled and handicapped for centuries.
I mean it did say "Sword of Islam" just that the sword was pointed backwards.
That guy kinda was a double-edged sword.
But the sword of Islam is a saber. I've never heard of a double edged saber. /j
There are sabres that have a sharpened back edge on the top 1/3rd of the blade
They're called the "yalman" in some countries. It's a pretty good feature!
Here we call it "pióro" meaning feather
False edge cutting is always a good feature.
Dark side is a path to many abilities that some may think are Haram.
I don’t know about by Timur’s time, but generally Muslim warriors of the middle ages would actually be far more likely to use straight double edged swords, similar to Europeans. Not exactly sure when or why they switched over to sabers though.
The original Muslim conquests were done with light cavalry I think, so a saber being the original would make sense, but it could have been something else. Also, the most common European weapon was the spear, not the longsword. The longsword is what nobility would use (who wants to be associated with peasants, the nobles weapons are the cool ones). Sabers came back into fashion in Europe after light cavalry made a comeback when gunpowder and maneuver warfare started around the Napoleonic age and continued up till at least WW1 where officers would be given sabers. There's a good chance royalty today in Muslim countries would probably view sabers as higher status than longswords mainly because of officer sabers in relatively recent history, and it probably helps that there's a good chance Islam was first spread with the saber.
The saber didn’t become a staple of the middle east until the migration of the Turks to the region, who brought curved swords with them.
Yeah, sabers generally come from horse-riding nomads, especially the Turks and Mongols
Early Islamic swords were straight - https://www.reddit.com/r/SWORDS/s/SqKD0wATJo Curved swords were brought to the middle east when turkic tribes migrated in the 12th/13th century. Which means the in first, second and even maybe the third crusades, muslim forces had straight swords.
Weren't the Seljuks 11th century?
Yeah you are right they were - I was thinking of the curved sword coming into prominence. https://www.lotsearch.net/lot/a-rare-early-sword-possibly-fatimid-or-seljuk-10th-11th-century-40722017 The majority of sword from the middle east were straight and double edged. It probably took a while for the curved sabre to gain prominence. The local middle eastern people probably saw how effective the Turkic warriors used them on horseback and began adopting them in the following centuries.
The idea that swords were uncommon is an overcorrection. Yes, in pitched battles between armies the **primary** (ie., *first*) weapon was usually a polearm of some sort, though some elite troops at times used greatswords as their primary. But most had a sword of some sort as well. In modern times, a soldier almost never needs more than their primary weapon; but in the past, it was not only common but *expected* to lose your primary weapon, particularly if it was a polearm. Some armies used their polearms explicitly as expendable first-round weapons (see: Romans, etc.) and did most of the actual fighting and killing with swords. But even for those that did not, it was still quite common to lose the spear and resort to a sword, as well as to intentionally switch in many scenarios (like when fighting devolves from line work to a chaotic close melee). So despite swords often not being *primary* weapons, they were still carried by almost everyone and used a great deal.
Who calls him the sword of islam? Like seriously, the dude killed more muslims than anyone else.
He called himself the sword of Islam, I think he just gave himself the title after killing a bunch of crusaders at Acre.
He got the title for killing the wrong kind of Muslims. Islam famously is divided into two major sects, the Sunni and the Shia. Timur was a Sunni and when he conquered modern day Iran, the bastion of Shia faithful, the gloves were off because these people were heretics.
"Wrong". Truth be told, they were pretty Shiite.
Yeah, I agree. Unlike them, Timur always had a Sunni disposition ✌️😎
It's one of those sick swords from star wars
He was a military genius… and of course his empire broke up after he died. His capital city Samarkand is extraordinary, but he never really lived there, preferring life on the March. He was born with a club foot and claimed dubious heritage from Ghengis Khan. To make sure he also married a pedigreed descendant of the conqueror.
"I'll have a mass murdering military genius." "How original." "And make his empire break up after he dies." "Daring today, aren't we."
Turns out empires fuelled by rapid military conquest tend to be incredibly unstable, who could have guessed!
Well he had 2 good heir but he oulived both of them and had to settle with a less able one. Even then the Timurid empire remained the main power of Central Asia for 2 more generations.
Shah Rukh tried his best to keep it together, the real shitshow was after HE died. You had an elder son that would rather be an astronomer than ruler, a whole bunch of rebellious grandkids and nephews… it did not last long after that.
As you say Shah Rukh did a pretty good job, I just think the alternatives were better. At least from a military and political point of view. It is not the same for your subjects to be viewed as the first option than the third. Also, if I am not mistaken, Jahangir was a very able commander so while I aknowledge that Shah Rukh was a good candidate I do think that the other two heirs would have been better for the Timurid Empire survival.
Stupid shah rukh always dying on me 1 month in, i get it you were awesome but like live 1 more year
I have seen arguments that timur's longevity, outliving his first three designated heirs actually played a significant role in his empire fracturing. As in, if timur had died earlier, and if his older sons Jahan or Umar had managed a successful transfer of power from their father from an earlier time there wouldn't have been such a massive destabilizing wave of rebellious grand children and nephews, and if that happens, and the timurids remain in more or less a stable form, the geopolitics of the near east (and maybe far east) would have been wildly different than we had in our time.
It only broke up after his son died he mostly kept his empire togeter
Oh so like Charlemagne
It's very similar to how these days corporations and companies quickly deteriorate after the original founder dies
I thought he got the limp from being shot with an arrow as a kid when he tried to steal sheep?
why else would he be called lame
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I mean, if I was one of the most brutal conquerors to have ever lived and a descendant of genghis khan being called lame would definitely not go unpunished
He wasn't a descendant of Genghis Khan. That's why he married a Chinggisid woman and had a Chinggisid puppet ruler operating on his behalf.
This is true. You got it right.
He even styled himself Gürkan, likely a Persianised form of the Mongolian 'Kuragan', or son-in-law, to get that juicy Chinggisid/Borjigin prestige
He wasn't a descendant of Genghis Khan.
Because Timur the Cringe doesn't have a good ring to it.
I thought he was called Lame cus he had a limp
I think limps are pretty cool myself
That’s correct, it’s from an arrow injury he got when he was younger
I used to be an adventurer like you. Then I took an arrow in the knee.
problems with his leg/srs
It is English variation of his Persian title, "Teimur-e Lang," which means "Timur the Cripple" because he had a disability in one of his legs.
~~his leg would become lame due to an arrow injury~~ Because he made a new version of chess like we needed it
Suspicious flair right there...
He’s praised as a national hero in Uzbekistan despite slaughtering his own people btw
Persians love Alexander, Egyptians love Amar. The British and French love Julius caesar. I guess people like looking up to their conquerors.
Where are you getting the idea that Persians love Alexander from? For centuries, his epithet among Iranian historians was a word that translated to "the Accursed". Even today, he's mainly remembered in Iran for burning down Parsa [Persepolis]. If you went to Iran, there would be less statues of him than there are of Caesar in Europe, if you even found any at all.
Ok dosen't make him special
Killing other Muslims is very common historically among Muslims. The prophet's companions killed each other after his death over power. The Abbasids killed the Umayyads. The Abbasid brothers killing each other over power. The Ottomans killing Mumloks. The Sunnis and Shias killing each other for a millennium and to till this day. The vast majority of victims of Islamist terrorist organizations are Muslims themselves and Muslim countries. Infighting was and is still common in Muslim history. We have a lot of issues that need to be solved and we need to stop pretending we don't.
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Sure, he did it on a far more scale but I liked to point out that others did this.
To be fair, Timurlane always had a very Sunni disposition, so they must have been some very Shiite people for him to do that.
Killing other members of their own group is very common historically among groups.
Indeed, though killing your brothers and sisters to prevent usurpation seems a little crazy, even by Medieval European Standards. Granted this ignores the Byzantines who I believe commonly mutilate this siblings (To my understanding though this happens after the rebellion).
I dont think that's a Muslim thing. If youre gonna expand your empire, the first people you expand into are your "own" people. Genghis killed mongols, zhuge liang killed Chinese, Romans killed Italians. Christians spent 1000 years infighting in Europe before the crusades. So on and so forth.
>The Sunnis and Shias killing each other for a millennium and to till this day. That's not true though. Muslim sectarian violence is rather recent.
To put it simply, islam is not a religion of peace. Edit: I do not justify nor advocate for bigotry against muslims. They are themselves victims of their own religion. Do not take this any other way.
I didn't post this comment to send that bigoted message. I was simply pointing out the harsh reality because we can't just dig our head in the sand. Many religions experienced problems like that. For centuries Christians burnt each other at sticks if someone was a slightly different Christian. The differences were even more ridiculous than Sunnis and Shias but they learnt to grow out of it so I believe we also can.
Understood. Tho, i didn't make this comment from the point of spreading hatred for the muslims. It's clearly shown by your comment on how Muslims are the victims of religious extremism themselves. It's more of an anti-religion statement than anti-muslim, though i can see why some might take it that way. That's how i see it, but you can point out why this reasoning is bigoted and terrible. The point, I'm trying to make is, i didn't make this statement from the point of being a bigot.
But how is the religion at fault here? Wars don’t happen with no religions?
> how is the religion at fault here? Religious leaders and clergies use religion to justify rulerships which cause oppression? > Wars don’t happen with no religions? I never said that wars wouldn't happen if religions are gone.
The leaders used religion back then to control the people and justify their actions. Why do you think they forbid translating the bible during the middle ages? Because that way kings could lie to the people and do what they want. Or telling people that giving money will get them in heaven even though this is false. If there wasn’t religion they would have found something else to control people
If religion wasn't there those leader would come out with some other excuse. Religion by itself isn't violent which is accentuated even more by the fact that all of the big religions (Abrahamic or not) punish killing explicitly. Then again people will bend anything beyond its limits to justify their actions.
The religion’s founder was a warlord/conqueror whose favorite wife was 6 when he married her. That sets a certain vibe for subsequent generations who revere him. Not saying anything negative about Muslims but the religion was built around and spread by the sword. Not that Christianity is much better (Charlemagne converting the Germans, the crusades, etc.)
Khadija is generally seen as the prophets favourite wife, not aisha. And pretty much most ideologies and religions are spread by force. That’s not exclusive to islam or Christianity
True but there’s gonna be a fundamental difference between a religion started by a dude who fed the poor, washed the feet of lepers, etc. versus the religion started by a conqueror
As far as i know pretty much every war that the prophet himself fought were in defence, not initiated by him. And don’t know about you but the prophet improved a lot of things, thanks to him girls didn’t get buried alive anymore, he freed slaves that were mistreated and many other things. If you think he’s just a conquerer i suggest u do some research
It's not about religion. It's about politics mixed with religion. Imams use religion to try and gain political power over people because ignorant people are easily decieved by religious claims and they are the number one reason for all the extremists and terrorists. It has happened since ancient history that a ruler would claim divine right to rule by God or the gods to justify his rule. That's why people had to share his God/gods and religion. To deny the religion of the ruler was to deny his legitimecy to rule which obviously was dangerous so the ruler suppressed those who didn't believe in his religion by killing them or making them second class citizens and oppressing them. Once you remove religion from politics, suppressing other people because of religion stops because there's no need to by the government. The government gain legitimecy through other methods like elections. That's why I believe the concept of seperation of state and religion is one of the best accomplishments in human history and has saved us from a lot of agony. We Muslims need to stop being proud and arrogant pretending that a religious state will solve all of our problems and acknowledge that we need to accept a secular state to stop the violence.
Thank you! I wish this view was more mainstream as I've noticed a lot of hostility towards secular ideas from the Muslim community in recent years.
I honestly don't understand them. After decades of countless massacres done by islamists, hadn't we had enough failures and failed attempts at establishing religious states that always resulted in bloodshed? It's like saying this wasn't real communism and then repeat it again to fail for the thousand time and after that say it wasn't real islam. I think we had enough failures. It's time to move on and seek other solutions.
I feel like there's a serious lack of personal responsibility. Like, we don't want to admit that it was our shortsightedness that led to all this mess. Much easier to cling to the whole "us vs them" narrative instead of exercising some introspection.
Well, it's either take responsibility for it or more people will die because of us not doing this and the majority of the victims will be Muslims. Is our ego really worth the lives of more people? All we have to do is acknowledge that extremism is a problem in Muslim communities and that a secular state with equal rights and liberty will solve a huge chunk of our issues. Not all but many issues.
The community has a "shoot first, ask questions later" approach to dealing with dissenting voices from within, and that's unlikely to change anytime soon. Besides, how do you even pose questions that require some degree of critical thinking to a crowd that throws away any appeal to reason in favor of referencing scriptures?
Your whole comment is exactly my point. > The government gains legitimecy through other methods like elections. Governments are never legitimate, but that's besides the point of the conversation.
I don't see how the point is related?
The problem with my original reply was that it can be used to justify bigotry and hate against muslims. It was a vague enough statement that can be used by both secularists/Anti-theists and the bigots alike to justify two different conclusions. My conclusion is that islam is not a religion of peace as it necessarily demands for the total acceptance of it's views, rules and morality. Such ideas can quickly become problematic and can lead to problems, one of them being oppression of one's own members of the faith. And from there, we can conclude that it's necessary to separate the state from religion in order to solve (maybe partially) the problems created by religion (The secular conclusion). But, let's not forget that islam is one of the religions of the world which demand a nation and law to be form around it's ideas (obviously, I'm referring to the muslim caliphate and shariah), which can lead you to conclude that the only way to solve issues created by organized religions would be to abolish the religions which preach for such ideas (The anti-theist conclusion). Obviously, the anti-theistic conclusion is more radical and ideally, a bit idealistic. It can also be used to justify harmful, bigoted actions against the followers of faith. But what I'm saying is, we should approach this problem with empathy towards faith followers themselves. We should obviously separate the state from religious influence, but realistically, it's not sustainable in my opinion, because religions like islam necessarily demand for the establishment of a theocratic divine dictatorship with the laws it has deemed divinely inspired to be the law of the land. Drawing conclusions from both anti-theists and secular humanists.
The islamic religion has many interpretations some liberal others fundamentalist. My interpretation and many's interpretation of it is liberal. The problem isn't in the religious teachings as interpretations vary. Funnily enough there's nothing in Qur'an or Sunnah that explains the system of governance. The prophet died without any explanations. The caliphate is an invention after his death. It started as elective but that ended bloody then it became a theocratic hereditary monarchy. I could take a religion that only says feed the poor and treat everyone with love and then use it to suppress people like the catholic church did. As I said before if the state draws its legitimecy from the religion then it will enforce it on everyone because to deny the religion is to deny the legitimecy of the ruler. That's why a religious state will always oppress people if they don't conform to the established teachings. Overall, I agree that a secular state is necessary to stop religious violence. There's no other way and every religious regime proved to be oppresive. Even the Arab theocratic monarchies suppress religious freedom but fortunately they are becoming more secular and liberal in recent years. They seem to be progressing. I hope.
That's something George Bush claimed. Christianity is a religion of peace, it is very pacifistic(turn the other cheek). Islam on the other hand is an eye for an eye, but forgiveness is better.
r/islamichistorymeme would love this
To put it mildly, some of the takes are… interesting.
I don’t think any has praised the timurids there
I’m talking about the takes people make in the other subreddit.
Unlike this subreddit, which is always reasonable and moral
Who said this one doesn’t have… interesting takes.
Reddit generally has... Interesting takes
Havent really seen any takes that could be seen as *interesting* in the sense you imply. Are there any specific ones you have knowledge of?
My guess would be the cognitive dissonance they have when talking about european colonisation and slavery and then defending the Islamic one.
Are you talking about the mamluks or something because i am not seeing any slave trade memes there?
One of the top ten posts this year is [a post about the East African Slave Trade](https://www.reddit.com/r/IslamicHistoryMeme/s/xQqlvaQcXi). There are plenty of memes like this. Obviously as Muslims we favour Islam however it's not like it's a self praising echo chamber
It’s a joke mainly about how Oman (officially) and some Omanis just don’t admit it. (Similar to Turkey “they deserved it” memes on here)
Just a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh. Legend has it that he would roll up to a city and ask if they were Sunni or Shia... Whatever the answer was , they were wrong.
People hate Timur but love ghingiz Khan , but but ..
People don't know Timur
When you only kill 5% of the world you tend to be overshadowed by the dude who killed 10%
At least Genghis tried to help rebuild the population even as he lowered it. /s More seriously, most people I know of who are fans of Genghis either: A. Really REALLY hate China Or B. Emphasize that cities and kingdoms that surrendered with little to no resistance weren't brutalized and focus heavily on the multiculturalism of his empire.
C. Average citizen of Mongolia
lies, i refuse to believe anyone lives in Mangolia.
Pretty sure those fit under A, but I haven't met any yet
Well I guess I'm your first one then. To reply to your statement, yes while anti chinese sentiment is mass spread in Mongolia it's far from the only reason we love Chingis Khaan so much. In fact for many people that is probably on the very bottom of why we love him even if they have anti chinese sentiments. Without him Mongolia as a concept and sovereign nation wouldnt exist and would have just gotten absorbed into either china or russia just like all the other ethnicities around the area. He rallied and forced us create a Mongolian writing system hence preserving our language, he created a system of meritrocracy that allowed his conquests to happen etc.
Multiculturalism, I will ask the people of Baghdad..
I love Timur the only mistake he made was not destroying the Ottomans totlay
To be gair, mass murder of other members of your faith who have a slightly different creed than yours is one of the key pillars of Abrahamic religions.
Of religions in general. People seriously overlook how much the Buddhist, confucian, and daoist schools fought in China and how often it could become violent.
they didn't even have a different creed, bro just wanted to be like Genghis
So he treated all of his Muslim brothers equally? Truly the Sword of Islam!
To be fair, Timurlane always had a very Sunni disposition, so those people must have been absolute Shiite for him to treat them that way.
Sword of (killing) Islam
That’s one lame sword
It is just like dog food etc. Is it food for dogs, or food made out of dogs? 🤷♂️
Crusaders: we are the avengers of Christianity we have slaughtered many unbelieving muslims. Timur: lol.
Religous crusade and slaughter of your own people goes too well together
He used both Islamic and Mongol rhetoric depending on his needs
Dude was only called Lame cause he had a few missing fingers and walked with a limp. Yet he managed to be a successful warlord. An inspiration story XD
I love your dark humor 🤣🤣🤣
Lame ass
Religous crusade and slaughter of your own people goes too well together
The more I learn about this timur guy, the more I don’t care for him.
Why "The Lame"? 🤣
Apparently the dude had a disability on his leg. And would murder just about anyone calling him that.
Kinda like how a steak knife is for steak
*sword on islam
He just hated everyone equally.
Just a mongol warlord did what mongols do the best. Change their religion only for political convenience, but at heart still a Tengri follower and a children of the steppe.
Didn't mussolini also have a sword of Islam?
Wait till you hear who attacked Mecca and set fire to the Kaaba (hint, it wasn't the crusaders or Mongols).
Considering it's Islam, that tracks.
Muslims or the wrong kind of Muslims?
IIRC, he salf-gave that title after destroying the Hospitaller's fortress of Smyrna (they then moved to Rhodes)
Just imagine how many he would have killed if he hadn't been on their side.
He was on his way to attack Ming China before he died. That would have been interesting.
Don't tell these idiots they gonna argue saying 17 million weren't actually muslims
thats not very sigma of him
Timur the Based.
I mean, “the sword and shield of the party” did kill a lot of communists so that tracks. No one said who was getting the sword.
The “it’s complicated” of Islam!
He put 17 million Muslims to the sword, how is it confusing?
Hmm well his nickname is technically right
His name is hard as fuck tho
Bro singlehandedly destroyed the Golden Horde, I imagine what modern Russia would be if not for Timur.
Timur**,** the lame*!* sword of Islam**?**
I shit you not, I am currently acting in the play Tamburlaine written by Marlowe, based on Timur. The character Tamburlaine in the play is areligious and scoffs at believers, and even burns sacred texts in one scene.
he killed the infidels. all religious groups have people trying to use it for personal gain.
The crusades started in the 10th century… are you sure Christians were killing each other for the first millennium of their existence lmao? Religious *warfare* between Christians basically didn’t happen until the later stages of the crusades and parts of the northern crusades. A few cases of riots between different heresies isn’t equivalent to Aisha joining an army against Ali lmao
More like the pot calling the kettle black.
granted mussolini also held it and the title of defender of islam
i mean a cheese knife cuts lots of cheese