before his father, and therefore, never became supreme Khákán[1] in the regions he governed; but they descended intact to his own son and successor, Batu, as an appanage direct from Chingiz. The centre of this dominion may be taken to be the plains of Kipchak, but it comprised all the country lying north of the lower course of the Sir Daria (the Sihun or Jaxartes) and of the Aral and Caspian seas—"wherever the hoofs of Mongol horses had tramped"; it included also the valleys of the Volga and the Don, and some wide-spread regions on the north shore of the Black Sea; while towards the north it extended beyond the Upper Yaik (or Ural River) into Western Siberia. On its southern and south-eastern confines, this appanage of the Juji line marched with that of Chingiz's second son, Chaghatai, whose central kingdom, Mávará-un-Nahr, or Transoxiana, was situated chiefly between the rivers Sir and Amu (the Jihun or Oxus), but included, in its extension towards the north-east, the hill ranges and steppes lying beyond the right bank of the Sir, east of the Kipchak plains, and west of lakes Issigh-Kul and Ala-Nor. Towards the east, the Chaghatai domain took in the greater part of the region now known as Chinese (or Eastern) Turkistan, Farghána (or Khokand) and Badakhshan; while towards the south it embraced Kunduz, Balkh, and, at the outset, Khorasán—a country which, at that time, spread eastward to beyond Herat and Ghazni, and southward to Mekrán. This was, perhaps, the most extensive appanage of all, and within its limits were to be found the greatest variety of races and tribes, and the greatest diversity of modes of life. It comprised, on the one hand, some of the richest agricultural districts, peopled by settled inhabitants, far advanced in Asiatic civilisation, and some of the most flourishing cities in Asia; while, on the other hand, some of the rudest hill tribes, or Hazáras as they were called then, had their homes in the
- ↑ As the word Khákán will often be met with in the Tarikh-i-Rashidi, it may be explained, here, that the difference between it and the simple form of Khán was one of degree. Khákán was a form of Kaán which was, originally, the peculiar title of the supreme sovereign of the Mongols, while the subordinate princes of the Chaghatai, and other Chingizi lines, were styled only Khan. After a time the higher title degenerated, and was used by many besides the sovereign, as will be observed in the course of the Tarikh-i-Rashidi. Marco Polo always wrote Kaán, and applied the title to Kublai, the Mongol Emperor of China. The meaning of Khákán, Sir H. Yule considered to be "Khan of Khans," or the equivalent of the modern Khán-Khánán. (See Marco Polo, Intro. pp. 9, 10; also Dr. Terrien de Lacouperie in Babylonian and Oriental Record for December, 1888.)
